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St. Winifred's; or, The World of School

by F. W. Farrar · English · Gutenberg #24329 · 759,676 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: St. Winifred's; or, The World of School

Author: F. W. Farrar

Illustrator: H. C. Earnshaw


        
Release date: January 16, 2008 [eBook #24329]
                Most recently updated: July 3, 2014

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/24329

Credits: Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ST. WINIFRED'S; OR, THE WORLD OF SCHOOL ***




Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England




St Winifred's, or The World of School, by Frederic W. Farrar.

________________________________________________________________________
The story is another one about the intimate details of a life in a boys'
boarding school in late Victorian England.  Farrar, having himself
attended such a school, then later been an assistant master at another,
Harrow School, then Head Master of Marlborough College, was well placed
to write about such a school, and in some ways it is a better book than
his much more famous "Eric".

There are a number of very well-written and moving episodes in this
book, and the only thing that spoils the books is Farrar's habit of
putting quotations from Latin and Greek into his books.  Because of the
problem of rendering Greek script into European script, to no great
purpose, we have omitted all the longer Greek quotations at the start of
some of the chapters.

We have thoroughly enjoyed creating this e-book for you, and we hope
that you will enjoy it as much as we have.  We made a transcription
during March and April 2003, and then made a second transcription using
a different edition, in January 2008.

________________________________________________________________________
ST. WINIFRED'S, OR, THE WORLD OF SCHOOL, BY FREDERIC W. FARRAR.



CHAPTER ONE.

WALTER'S HOME.

  The merry homes of England!
  Around their hearths by night,
  What gladsome looks of household love,
  Meet in the ruddy light!

  Mrs Hemans.

"Good-bye, Walter; good-bye, Walter dear! good-bye!" and the last note
of this chorus was "Dood-bye," from a blue-eyed, fair-haired girl of two
years, as Walter disengaged his arms from his mother's neck, and sprang
into the carriage which had already been waiting a quarter of an hour to
convey him and his luggage to the station.

It is the old, old story: Mr Evson was taking his son to a large public
school, and this was the first time that Walter had left home.  Nearly
every father who deigns to open this little book has gone through the
scene himself; and he and his sons will know from personal experience
the thoughts, and sensations, and memories, which occupied the minds of
Walter Evson and his father, as the carriage drove through the garden
gate and the village street, bearing the eldest boy of the young family
from the sacred and quiet shelter of a loving home, to a noisy and
independent life among a number of strange and young companions.

If you have ever stood on the hill from which Walter caught a last
glimpse of the home he was leaving, and waved his final farewell to his
mother, you are not likely to have forgotten the scene which was then
spread before your eyes.  On the right-hand side, the low hills, covered
with firs, rise in gentle slopes one over the other, till they reach the
huge green shoulder of a mountain, around whose summits the clouds are
generally weaving their awful and ever-changing diadem.  To the left,
between the road and a lower range of wooded undulations, is a deep and
retired glen, through which a mountain stream babbles along its hurried
course, tumbling sometimes in a noisy cataract and rushing wildly
through the rough boulder stones which it has carried from the heights,
or deepening into some quiet pool, bright and smooth as glass, on the
margin of which the great purple loosestrife and the long fern-leaves
bend down as though to gaze at their own reflected beauty.  In front,
and at your feet, opens a rich valley, which is almost filled as far as
the roots of the mountains by a lovely lake.  Beside this lake the white
houses of a little village cluster around the elevation on which the
church and churchyard stand; while on either shore, rising among the
fir-groves that overshadow the first swellings of the hills, are a few
sequestered villas, commanding a prospect of rare beauty, and giving a
last touch of interest to the surrounding view.

In one of these houses--that one with the crowded gables not a hundred
feet above the lake, opposite to which you see the swans pluming their
wings in the sunlight, and the green boat in its little boathouse--lived
the hero of our story; and no boy could have had a dearer or lovelier
home.  His father, Mr Evson, was a man in easy, and almost in affluent
circumstances, who, having no regular occupation, had chosen for himself
this quiet retreat, and devoted all his time and care to the education
of his family, and the ordinary duties of a country gentleman.

Walter was the eldest child, a graceful, active, bright-eyed boy.  Up to
this time--and he was now thirteen years old--he had had no other
teaching but that of his father, and of a tutor, who for the last year
had lived in the house.  His education, therefore, differed considerably
from that of many boys of his own age, and the amount of book knowledge
which he had acquired was small as yet; but he was full of that
intelligent interest in things most worth knowing, which is the best and
surest guarantee for future progress.

Let me pause for a moment to relate how a refined and simple-hearted
gentleman had hitherto brought up his young boys.  I do not pronounce
whether the method was right or wrong; I only describe it as it was, and
its success or failure must be inferred from the following pages.

The positive teaching of the young Evsons did not begin too early.  Till
they were ten or twelve years old nearly all they did know had come to
them either intuitively or without any conscious labour.  They were
allowed almost to live in the open air, and nature was their wise and
tender teacher.  Some object was invented, if possible, for every walk.
Now it was to find the shy recesses of the wood where the wild
strawberries were thickest, or where the white violets and the rarest
orchis flowers were hid; or to climb along the rocky sides of the glen
to seek the best spot for a rustic meal, and find mossy stones and
flower-banks for seats and tables near some waterfall or pool.

When they were a little older their father would amuse and encourage
them until they had toiled up even to the very summit of all the nearest
hills, and there they would catch the fresh breeze which blew from the
far-off sea, or gaze wonderingly at the summer lightning flashing behind
the chain of hills, or watch, with many playful fancies, the long
gorgeous conflagration of the summer sunset.  And in such excursions
their father or mother would teach them without seeming to teach them,
until they were thoroughly familiar with the names and properties of all
the commonest plants, and eagerly interested to secure for their little
collections, or to plant in their gardens, the different varieties of
all the wild flowers that were found about their home.  Or, again, when
they sat out in the garden, or wandered back in the autumn twilight from
some gipsy party, they were taught to recognise the stars and planets,
until Mars and Jupiter, Orion and Cassiopeia, the Pleiads and the
Northern Crown, seemed to look down upon them like old and beloved
friends.

It was easy, too, and pleasant, to teach them to love and to treat
tenderly all living things--to observe the little black-eyed squirrel
without disturbing him while he cracked his nuts; to watch the
mistle-thrush's nest till the timid bird had learned to sit there
fearlessly, and not scurry away at their approach; and to visit the
haunts of the moorhen without causing any consternation to her or her
little black velvet progeny.  Visitors who stayed at the house were
always delighted to see how all creatures seemed to trust the children:
how the canary would carol in its cage when they came into the room; how
the ponies would come trotting to the boys across the field, and the
swans float up and plume their mantling wings, expecting food and
caresses, whenever they came in sight.

The lake was a source of endless amusement to them; summer and winter
they might have been seen bathing in its waters, till they were bold
swimmers, or lying to read their books in the boat under the shade of
the trees, or rowing about till the little boy of six years was allowed
to paddle himself alone to the other side, and even when the waves were
rough, and the winds high, the elder ones were not afraid to venture
out.  In short, they were healthy and manly mountain-boys, with all
their senses admirably exercised, and their powers of observation so
well trained, that they sometimes amazed their London cousins by
pointing to some falcon poised far-off above its prey, which was but a
speck to less practised eyes, or calling attention to the sweetness of
some wood-bird's note, indistinguishable to less practised ears.

Even in such lessons as these they would have made but little progress
if they had not been trained in the nursery to be hardy, modest,
truthful, unselfish, and obedient.  This work had effectually been done
when alone it _can_ be effectually done, in the earliest childhood, when
the sweet and plastic nature may acquire for all that is right and good
the powerful aid of habit, before the will and the passions are fully
conscious of their dangerous and stubborn power.

Let no one say that I have been describing some youthful prodigies.
There are thousands such as I describe in all happy and well-ordered
English homes; there might be thousands more if parents spent a more
thoughtful care upon the growth of their children; there will be many,
many thousands more as the world, "in the rich dawn of an ampler day,"
in the gradual yet noble progress of social and moral improvement,
becomes purer and holier, and more like Him Who came to be the ideal of
the loftiest, yet the lowliest, of the most clear-sighted, yet the most
loving, of the most happy, and yet the most humble manhood.



CHAPTER TWO.

SAINT WINIFRED'S.

  Gay Hope is theirs by Fancy led,
  Less pleasing when possess'd,
  The tear forgot as soon as shed,
  The sunshine of the breast.

  Grey.

Walter's destination was the school of Saint Winifred.  Let me here say
at once that if any reader set himself to discover what and where the
school of Saint Winifred is, he will necessarily fail.  It is
impossible, I suppose, to describe _any_ school without introducing
circumstances so apparently special as to lead some readers into a
supposed identification.  But here, and once for all, I distinctly and
seriously repudiate all intention of describing any particular
foundation.  I am well aware that for some critics this disclaimer will
be insufficient.  But every _honourable_ reader and critic may rest
assured that in describing Saint Winifred's I have not intended to
depict any one school, and that no single word dictated by an unworthy
personality will find a place in the following pages.

Saint Winifred's School stands by the seaside, on the shores of a little
bay embraced and closed in by a range of hills whose sweeping semicircle
is only terminated on either side by the lofty cliffs which, in some
places, are fringed at the base by a margin of sand and shingle, and in
others descend with sheer precipices into the ever-boiling surf.  Owing
to the mountainous nature of the country, the railroad cannot approach
within a distance of five miles, and to reach the school you must drive
through the dark groves which cover the lower shoulder of one of the
surrounding mountains.  When you reach the summit of this ascent, the
bay of Saint Winifred lies before you; that line of white houses a
quarter of a mile from the shore is the village, and the large
picturesque building of old grey stone, standing in the angle where the
little river reaches the sea, is Saint Winifred's School.

The carriage stopped at the grand Norman archway of the court.  The
school porter--the Famulus as they classically called him--a
fine-looking man, whose honest English face showed an amount of thought
and refinement above his station, opened the gate, and, consigning
Walter's play-box and portmanteau to one of the school servants,
directed Mr Evson across the court and along some cloisters to the
house of Dr Lane, the headmaster.  The entering of Walter's name on the
school books was soon accomplished, and he was assigned as private pupil
to Mr Robertson, one of the tutors.  Dr Lane then spoke a word of
encouragement to the young stranger, and he walked back with his father
across the court to the gate, where the carriage was still waiting to
take Mr Evson to meet the next train.

"Please let us walk up to the top of the hill, papa," said Walter; "I
shan't be wanted till tea-time, and I needn't bid good-bye to you here."

Mr Evson was as little anxious as Walter to hasten the parting.  They
had never been separated before.  Mr Evson could look back for the rare
period of thirteen years, during which they had enjoyed, by God's
blessing, an almost uninterrupted happiness.  He had begun life again
with his young children; he could thoroughly sympathise alike with their
thoughts and with their thoughtlessness, and by training them in a
manner at once wise and firm, he had been spared the greater part of
that anxiety and disappointment which generally spring from our own
mismanagement.  He deeply loved, and was heartily proud of, his eldest
boy.  There is no exaggeration in saying that Walter had all the best
gifts which a parent could desire.  There was something very interesting
in his appearance, and very winning in his modest and graceful manners.
It was impossible to see him and not be struck with his fine open face,
and the look of fearless and noble innocence in his deep blue eyes.

It was no time for moral lectures or formal advice.  People seem to
think that a few Polonius-like apophthegms delivered at such a time may
be of great importance.  They may be, perhaps, if they be backed-up and
enforced by previous years of silent and self-denying example; otherwise
they are like seed sown upon a rock, like thistle-down blown by the wind
across the sea.  Mr Evson spoke to Walter chiefly about home, about
writing letters, about his pocket-money, his amusements, and his
studies, and Walter knew well beforehand, without any repetitions
_then_, what his father wished him to be, and the principles in
accordance with which he had endeavoured to mould his thoughts and
actions.

The time passed too quickly for them both; they were soon at the top of
the hill where the carriage awaited them.

"Good-bye, Walter.  God bless you," said Mr Evson, shaking hands for
the last time, and throwing deep meaning into those simple words.

"Good-bye, papa.  My best love to all at home," said Walter, trying to
speak cheerfully, and struggling manfully to repress his rising tears.

The carriage drove on.  Walter watched it out of sight, and, turning
round, felt that a new phase of his life had begun, and that he was
miserably alone.  It was natural that he should shed a few quiet tears
as he thought of the dear friends with whom he had parted, and the four
hundred strangers into whose society he was about to enter.  Yet being
brave and innocent he feared nothing, and, without any very definite
religious consciousness, he had a clear and vivid sense that One Friend
was ever with him.

The emotions of a boy are as transient as they are keen, and Walter's
tears were soon dried.  As he looked round, the old familiar voice of
the mountains was in his ears.  He gazed with the delight of friendship
on their towering summits, and promised himself, many an exhilarating
climb up their steep sides.  And now, too, for the first time--for
hitherto he had not much noticed the scenery around him--a new voice,
the great voice of the sea, broke with its grand but awful monotony upon
his listening ear.  As he gazed upon the waves, glowing and flashing
with the golden network of autumnal sunbeams, it seemed to dawn upon him
like the discovery of a new sense, and he determined to stroll down to
the beach before re-entering the gates of Saint Winifred.

He wandered there not only with a boy's delight, but with the delight of
a boy whose eyes and ears have always been open to the beauty and wonder
of the outer world.  He longed to have his brother with him there.  He
picked up handfuls of the hard and sparkling sand; he sent the broad
flat pebbles flying over the surface, and skimming through the crests of
the waves; he half-filled his pockets with green and yellow shells, and
crimson fragments of Delessaria Sanguinea for his little sisters; and he
was full of pleasurable excitement when the great clock of Saint
Winifred's, striking five, reminded him that he had better go in, and
learn something, if possible, about the order of his future life.



CHAPTER THREE.

NEW BOYS.

  _Parolles_.--I find my tongue is too foolhardy.

  All's Well that Ends Well, Act four, scene 1.

The Famulus--"familiar"--as the boys called him, directed Walter across
the court to the rooms of his housekeeper, who informed him about the
places where his clothes and his play-boxes would be kept, and the
dormitory where he was to sleep.  She also gave him a key of the desk in
the great schoolroom, in which he might, if he chose, keep his portable
property.  She moreover announced, with some significance, that she
should be glad to do anything for him which lay in her humble power, and
that the day after to-morrow was her birthday.  Walter was a little
puzzled as to the relevancy of the latter piece of information.  He
learnt it at a subsequent period, when he also discovered that Mrs
Higgins found it to her interest to have periodical birthdays, recurring
two or three times at least every half-year.  The years which must have
passed over that good lady's head during Walter's stay at Saint
Winifred's--the premature rapidity with which old age must have
subsequently overtaken her, and the vigour which she displayed at so
advanced a period of life--were something quite extraordinary of their
kind.

Towards the great schoolroom Walter accordingly directed his steps.  The
key turned out to be quite superfluous, for the hasp of the lock had
been broken by Walter's predecessor, who had also left the trace of his
name, his likeness, and many interesting though inexplicable designs and
hieroglyphics, with a red-hot poker, on the lid.  The same gentleman, to
judge by appearances, must have had a curious entomological collection
of spiders and earwigs under his protection, and had bequeathed to
Walter a highly miscellaneous legacy of rubbish.  Walter contemplated
his bequest with some dismay, and began busily to dust the interior of
the desk, and make it as fit a receptacle as he could for his writing
materials and other personal possessions.

While thus engaged he could not help being secretly tickled by the
proceedings of a group of boys standing round the large unlighted stove,
and amusing themselves, harmlessly for the most part, with the
inexperience and idiosyncrasies of various newcomers.  After tiring
themselves with the freaks of a mad Irish boy who had entered into the
spirit of his own cross-examination with a high sense of buffoonery
which refused to grow ill-tempered, they were now playing on the extreme
gullibility of a heavy, open-mouthed, bullet-headed fellow, named
Plumber, from whom the most astounding information could extract no
greater evidence of sensation than a little wider stare of the eyes, and
an unexcited drawl of "Really though?"  One of the group, named
Henderson, a merry-looking boy with a ceaseless pleasant twinkle of the
eyes, had been taxing his own invention to the uttermost without in the
least exciting Plumber's credulity.

"You saw the fellow who let you in at the school gates, Plumber?" said
Henderson.  "Yes; I saw someone or other."

"But did you notice him particularly?"

"No, I didn't notice him."

"Well, you should have done.  That man's called `the Familiar.'  Ask
anyone if he isn't?  But do you know why?"

"No," said Plumber.

"It's because he's got a familiar spirit which waits on him," said
Henderson mysteriously.

"Really though," said Plumber, and this time he looked so frightened
that it was impossible for the rest to avoid bursting into a fit of
laughter, during which Plumber, vaguely comprehending that he was
considered a very good joke, retired with discomfiture.

"You fools," said Henderson; "if you'd only given me a little more time
I'd have made him believe that Lane had a tail, and wore his gown to
conceal it, except when he used it to flog with; and that before being
entered he would have to sing a song standing on his head.  You've quite
spoilt my game by bursting out laughing."

"There's another new fellow," said Kenrick, one of the group.  "Come
here, you new fellow!" called two or three of them.

Walter looked up, thinking that he was addressed, but found that the
summons was meant for a boy, rather good-looking but very slender, whose
self-important attitude and supercilious look betrayed no slight amount
of vanity, and who, to the apparent astonishment of the rest, was
surveying the room and its appurtenances with a look of great
affectation and disdain.

"So you don't much seem to like the look of Saint Winifred's," said
Kenrick to him, as the boy walked up with a delicate air.  "Not much,"
lisped the new boy; "everything looks so very common."

"Common and unclean to the last degree," said Henderson, imitating his
manner.

"And is this the only place you have to sit in?"

"O, by no means," said Henderson; "each of us has a private apartment
furnished in crimson and gold, according to the simple yet elegant taste
of the owner.  Our meals are there served to us by kneeling domestics on
little dishes of silver."

"I suppose you intend that for wit," said the new boy languidly.

"Yes; to do you, to wit," answered Henderson; "but seriously though,
that would be a great deal more like what you have been accustomed to,
wouldn't it, my friend?"

"Very much more," said the boy.

"And would you politely favour this company," said Henderson, with
obsequious courtesy, "by revealing to us your name?"

"My name is Howard Tracy."

"Oh, indeed!" said Henderson, with an air of great satisfaction, and
making a low bow.

"I am called Howard Tracy because I am descended lineally from both
those noble families."

"My goodness! are you really!" said Henderson, clasping his hands in
mock transport.  "My dear sir, you are an honour to your race and
country! you are an honour to this school.  By Jove, we are proud, sir,
to have you among us!"

"Perhaps you may not know that my uncle is the Viscount Saint George,"
said Tracy patronisingly.

"Is he, though, by George!" said Henderson yawning.  "Is that Saint
George who--

  "`Swinged the dragon, and e'er since
  Sits on his horseback at mine hostess' door?'"

But finding that the boy's vanity was too obtuse to be amusing any
longer, he was about to leave him to the rest, when Jones caught sight
of Walter, and called out:--

"Halloa, here's a new fellow grinning at the follies of his kind.  Come
here, you dark-haired chap.  What's your name?"

"Evson," said Walter, quietly approaching them.  Before getting any fun
out of him it was necessary to see what kind of boy he was; and as Jones
hardly knew what line to take, he began on the commonest and most vulgar
tack of catechising him about his family and relations.  "What's your
father?"

"My father is a gentleman," said Walter, rather surprised at the
rudeness of the question.

"And where do you live?"

"At Semlyn."

"And how old are you?"

"Just thirteen."

"And how many sisters have you?"

Walter rather thought of asking, "What's that to you?" but as he saw no
particular harm in answering the question, and did not want to seem too
stiff-backed, he answered, "Three."

"And are they very beautiful?"

"I don't know; I never asked them.  Are yours?"  This last question was
so perfectly quiet and unexpected, and Jones was so evidently
discomfited by it, that the rest burst into a roar of laughter, and
Henderson said, "You've caught a tartar, Jones.  You can't drop salt on
this bird's tail.  You had better return to Plumber, or Saint George and
the dragon.  Here, my noble Viscount, what do you think of your coeval?
Is he as common as the rest of us?"

"I don't think anything about him, if you mean me by Viscount," said
Tracy peevishly, beginning at last to understand that they had been
making a fool of him.

"Quite right, Saint George; he's beneath your notice."  Tracy ran his
hand through his scented hair, as if he rather Implied that he was; and
being mortified at the contrast between his own credulous vanity and
Walter's manly simplicity, and anxious if possible to regain his
position, he said angrily to Walter, "What are you looking at me for?"

Not wishing to be rude, Walter turned away, while someone observed, "A
cat may look at a king."

"Ay, a cat at a king, I grant you," answered Henderson; "but not a mere
son of Eve at any Howard Tracy."

"You are laughing at me," said Tracy to Walter again, in a still angrier
tone, seeing Walter smile at Henderson's remark.

"I've not the slightest wish to laugh at you," said Walter.

"Yes he has.  Shy this at him," said Jones, putting a great bit of
orange peel into Tracy's hand.

Tracy threw it at Walter, and he without hesitation picked it up, and
flung it back in Tracy's face.

"A fight! a fight!" shouted the mischief-making group, as Tracy made a
blind blow at Walter, which his antagonist easily parried.

"Make him fight you.  Challenge him," said Jones.  "Invite him to the
milling-ground behind the chapel after first school to-morrow morning."

"Pistols for _two_, coffee for four, at eight to-morrow," said
Henderson.  "Trample on the Dragon's tail, someone, and rouse him to the
occasion.  What! he won't come to the scratch?  Alack! alack!

  "`What can ennoble fools or cowards
  Not all the blood of all the Tracys, Dragons, and Howards!'"

He continued mischievously, as he saw that Tracy, on taking note of
Walter's compact figure, showed signs of declining the combat.

"Hush, Henderson," said Kenrick, one of the group who had taken no part
in the talk; "it's a shame to be setting two new fellows fighting their
first evening."

But Henderson's last remark had been too much for Tracy.  "Will you
fight?" he said, walking up to Walter with reddening cheeks.  For Tracy
had been to school before, and was no novice in the ways of boys.

"Certainly not," said Walter coolly, to everybody's great surprise.

"What! the other chap showing the white feather, too.  _All_ the new
fellows are cowards it seems this time," said Jones.  "This'll never do.
Pitch into him, Tracy."

"Stop," said Kenrick; "let's hear first why he won't fight?"

"Because I see no occasion to," said Walter; "and because, in the second
place, I never could fight in cold blood; and because, in the third
place--"

"Well, what in the third place?" said Kenrick, interested to observe
Walter's hesitation.

"In the third place," said Walter, "I don't say it from conceit--but
that boy's no match for me."

To anyone who glanced at the figures of the two boys this was obvious
enough, although Walter was a year the younger of the two.  The rest
began to respect Walter accordingly as a sensible little man, but Tracy
was greatly offended by the last remark, and Jones, who was a bully and
had a grudge against Walter for baffling his impertinence, exclaimed,
"Don't you be afraid, Tracy.  I'll back you.  Give him something to heat
his cold blood."

Fired at once by taunts and encouragements, Tracy did as he was bid, and
struck Walter on the face.  The boy started angrily, and at first seemed
as if he meant to return the blow with compound interest, but suddenly
changing his intention, he seized Tracy round the waist, and in spite of
all kicking and struggling, fairly carried the humiliated descendant of
the Howards and Tracys to a far corner of the room, where, amid a shout
of laughter, he deposited him with the laconic suggestion, "Don't you be
a fool."

Walter's blood was now up, and thinking that he might as well show, from
the very first, that he was not to be bullied, or made a butt with
impunity, he walked straight to the stove, and looking full at Jones
(who had inspired him already with strong disgust), he said, "You called
me a coward just now; I'm not a coward, though I don't like fighting for
nothing.  I'm not a bit afraid of _you_, though you forced that fellow
to hit me just now."

"Aren't you?  Saucy young cub!  Then take that," said Jones, enforcing
the remark with a box on the ear.

"And you take that," said Walter, returning the compliment with as much
energy as if he had been playing at the game of _Gif es wetter_.

Jones, astonished beyond measure, sprang forward, clenched his two
fists, squared, and blustered with great demonstrativeness.  He was much
Walter's senior, and was utterly taken by surprise at his audacity; but
he seemed in no hurry to avenge the insult.

"Well," said Walter, heaving with indignation, "why don't you hit me
again?"

Jones looked at his firm and determined little assailant with some
alarm, slowly tucked up the sleeves of his coat, turned white and red,
and--didn't return the blow.  The tea-bell beginning to ring at that
moment gave him a convenient excuse for breaking off the altercation.
He told his friends that he was on the point of thrashing Walter when
the bell rang, but that he thought it a shame to fight a new
fellow--"and in cold blood, too," he added, adopting Walter's language,
but not his sincerity.

"Don't call me a coward again then," said Walter to him as he turned
away.

"I say, Evson, you're a regular brick, a regular stunner," said young
Kenrick, delighted, as he showed Walter the way to the Hall where the
boys had tea.  "That fellow Jones is no end of a bully, and he won't be
quite so big in future.  You've taken him down a great many pegs."

"I say, Kenrick," shouted Henderson after them, "I bet you five to one I
know what you're saying to the new fellow."

"I bet you don't," said Kenrick, laughing.

"You're saying--it's a quotation, you know, but never mind--you're
saying to him, `A sudden thought strikes me: let's swear an eternal
friendship.'"

"Then you're quite out," answered Kenrick.  "I was saying come and sit
next me at tea."

"And go shares in jam," added Henderson: "exactly what I said, only in
other words."



CHAPTER FOUR.

FRIENDS AND FOES.

  "He who hath a thousand friends hath not one friend to spare,
  And he who hath one enemy shall meet him everywhere."

Already Walter had got someone to talk to, someone he knew; for in spite
of Kenrick's repudiation of Henderson's jest, he felt already that he
had discovered a boy with whom he should soon be friends.  It doesn't
matter how he had discovered it; it was by animal magnetism; it was by
some look in Kenrick's eyes; it was his light-heartedness; it was by the
mingled fire and refinement of his face which spoke of a wilful and
impetuous, yet also of a generous and noble nature.  Already he felt a
sense of ease and pleasure in the certainty that Kenrick--evidently no
cipher among his schoolfellows--was inclined to like him, and to show
him the ways of the school.

They went into a large hall, where the four hundred had their meals.
They sat at a number of tables arranged breadth-wise across the hall;
twenty or thirty sat at each table, and either a master or a monitor (as
the sixteen upper boys were called) took his place at the head of it.

"Now, mind you don't begin to smoke," said Henderson, as Walter went in,
and found most of the boys already seated.

"Smoke?" said Walter, taking it for a bit of good advice; "do fellows
smoke in Hall?  I never have smoked."

"Why, you're smoking now," said Henderson, as Walter, entering among the
crowd of strange faces and meeting so many pairs of eyes, began to blush
a little.

"Don't teaze him, Flip," said Kenrick.  "Smoking is the name fellows
give to blushing, Evson; and if they see you given to blushing, they'll
stare at you for the fun of seeing the colour mount up in your cheeks."

Accordingly, as he sat down, he saw that numerous eyes were turned upon
him and upon Tracy, who happened to sit at the same table.  Tracy,
unaccustomed to such very narrow scrutiny, blushed all over; and, as he
in vain looked up and down, this way and that, his cheeks grew hotter
and hotter, and he moved about in the most uneasy way, to the great
amusement of his many tormentors, until at last his eyes subsided
finally into his teacup, from which he did not again venture to raise
them until tea was over.  But Walter was at once up to the trick, and
felt thoroughly obliged to Henderson and Kenrick for telling him of it.
So he waited till he saw that a good dozen fellows were all intently
staring at him; and then, looking up very simply and naturally, he met
the gaze of two or three of them steadily in succession, and stared them
out of countenance with a quiet smile.  This turned the laugh against
them; and he heard the remark that he was "up to snuff, and no mistake."
No one ever tried to make Walter smoke again, but for some time it used
to be a regular joke to pass round word at tea-time, "Let's make Tracy
smoke," and as Tracy always _did_ smoke till he got thoroughly used to
it, he was generally glad when tea-time was over.

In spite of Henderson, who poked fun at them all tea-time (till he saw
that he really embarrassed them, and then he desisted), Kenrick sat by
Walter, and took him more or less under his protection; for an "old boy"
can always patronise a newcomer at first, even if they are of the same
age.

From Kenrick Walter learnt, rather to his dismay, that he really would
have no place to sit in except the big schoolroom, which he would share
with some fifty others, and that he would be placed in a dormitory with
at least five or six besides himself.

"Have you been examined yet?" asked Kenrick.

"No; but Dr Lane asked me what books I had read, and he told me that I
was to go and take my chance in Mr Paton's form.  What form is that?"

"It's what we call the Virgil form.  Have you ever read Virgil?"

"No; at least only a few easy bits."

"I wish you joy, then."

"Why? what sort of a fellow is Mr Paton?"

"Mr Paton? he's not a man at all; he's a machine; he's the wheel of a
mill; he's a cast-iron automaton; he's--"

"The abomination of desolation spoken of by Daniel the prophet,"
observed Henderson, who had caught a fragment of the conversation.  "I'm
in his form, too, worse luck!"

"Hush! shut up, Henderson, and don't be profane," said Kenrick.  "Well,
Evson, you'll soon find out what Paton's like; anything but `a patten of
bright gold' at any rate."

"Oh! oh! turn him out for his bad pun," said Henderson, hitting him with
a pellet of bread, for which offence he immediately received "fifty
lines" from the master at the other end of the table.

"Don't abuse Paton," said a boy named Daubeny, which name Henderson had
long ago contracted into Dubbs.  "I always found him a capital master to
be under, and really very kind."

"Oh, _you_--yes," answered Kenrick; "if we were all gifted with your
mouselike stillness in school, my dear old Dubbs--"

"And your metallic capacity of grind, my dear old Dubbs," added
Henderson.

"And your ostrich-like digestion of crabbed rules, my dear old Dubbs;
why, then," said Kenrick, "we should all be boys after Paton's heart."

"Or Paton's pattern," suggested Henderson; so it was now Kenrick's turn
to shudder at a miserable attempt at a pun, and return Henderson's
missile, whereupon he got a _hundred_ lines, which made him pull a very
long face.

"Who's to be your tutor, Evson?" he asked after this interlude.

"I suppose you're going to pick him to pieces, now," said Daubeny,
smiling; "don't you believe half they say of him, Evson."

"Oh, if you're sharp, and successful, and polite, and gentlemanly, and
jolly, and all that sort of thing, he'll like you very much, and be
exceedingly kind to you; but if you are lazy, or mischievous, or stupid,
or at all a pickle, he'll ignore you, snub you, won't speak to you.  I
wish you'd been in the same pupil-room with me."

"Depends on who he is, O virtuous Dubbs," said Henderson.  "His end
shall be `pieces,' as _Punch_ says, if he deserves it."

"He told me I was to be Mr Robertson's pupil," said Walter.  "Hum-m!"
observed Kenrick.  "Why, what sort of a person is he?"

"Some of his pups detest him, others adore him."

"Why?"

"Who's your tutor, then?"

"Percival; there, the master who is chatting and laughing with those
monitors.  He's a regular brick.  _Plinthos estin_ as we say in Greek,"
said Kenrick.  "Halloa! tea's over."

"And you've been chattering so much that the new fellow's had none,"
said Henderson, as a bell rang and one of the monitors read a short
Latin grace.

The boys streamed out, and Kenrick helped his new friend to unpack his
books and other treasures, and put them in his desk, for which they
ordered a new lock.  The rest of the evening was occupied with "Evening
Work," a time during which all the boys below a certain form sat in the
schoolroom, and prepared their lessons for the next day, while a master
occupied the desk to superintend and keep order.  As other boys who were
in the same form with himself were doing no work, Walter did not suppose
that any work would be expected of him the next morning, and he
therefore occupied his time in writing a long letter home.  When this
was over he began talking to Henderson, of whom he had a thousand
questions to ask, and whose chief amusement seemed to consist in
chaffing everybody, and whom, nevertheless, everybody seemed to regard
as a friend.  At nine a bell rang, the whole school went to chapel,
where a short evening service was held, and then all but the higher
forms, and the boys who had separate rooms, went to bed.  As Walter lay
down to sleep, he felt at least a century older than he had done that
morning.  Everything was marvellously new to him, but on the whole he
was inclined to take a bright view of things.  Two of the things which
had happened to him gave him special delight: the sight of the sea, and
the happy dawn--for as such he regarded it--of a genuine, hearty, boyish
friendship, both with Henderson and Kenrick.  When the gas was turned
off, tired out with his journey and his excitement, he quickly fell
asleep.

And, falling asleep, he at once passed into the land of dreams.  He was
out on the sea with Kenrick and Henderson in a row-boat, and all three
of them were fishing.  First there was a pull at Henderson's line, and,
tugging it up, he caught not a fish, but Jones, who, after a few
flounderings, lay down in the fish-basket.  As this did not in the least
surprise any of them, and excited no remark whatever, they set to work
again, and Kenrick had a bite this time, which proved to be Howard
Tracy, whom they laid quietly in the bottom of the boat, Jones
assisting.  The third time Walter himself had a tug, and was in the act
of hauling up Dubbs, when he became conscious that the boat was rocking
very violently, and he felt rather surprised that he was not seasick.
This seemed to give a new current to his thoughts, for all of a sudden
he was out riding with someone, and his horse began to rear in the most
uncomfortable manner, right on his hind legs.  He kept his seat
manfully--but no! that last rear was too much, and, suddenly waking, he
was at once aware that his bed was rising and falling in a series of
heavy shakes and bumps, whereby he was nearly flung off the mattress.
He instantly guessed the cause, for indeed, Kenrick had given him a hint
of such a possibility.  He knew that someone, wishing to frighten him,
had got under the bed, and was heaving it up and down with his back.
All that he had noticed when he undressed was, that there were several
big fellows in the dormitory, and he knew that the room had rather a bad
reputation for disorder and bullying.

Being a strong little fellow, brave as a lion, and very active, Walter
was afraid of no one; so springing up during a momentary cessation of
the mysterious upheavals, he instantly made a dash under the bed, and
seized someone by the leg.  The leg kicked violently, and as a leg is a
particularly strong limb, it succeeded in disengaging itself from
Walter's hands, not, however, till it had left a slipper as a trophy;
and with this slipper Walter pursued a dim white figure, which he could
just see scuttling away through the darkness to the other side of the
room.  This figure he overtook just in time to give it some resounding
smacks with the sole of the slipper; when the figure clutched a
counterpane off the nearest bed, flung it over Walter, and made good an
escape, while Walter was entangled, Agamemnon-like, in the voluminous
folds.  Walter, however, still kept possession of the slipper, and was
determined next morning to discover the owner.  He knew that it was
probably some bigger fellow who had been playing this game, and his
common sense told him that it was best to take it good-humouredly as a
joke, and yet at the same time to make it as little pleasant as possible
for the perpetrator, even if he got thrashed himself.  A bully or a
joker of practical jokes is not likely to do things which cause himself
a certain amount of discomfort, even if he succeeds in causing a still
greater amount to someone else.

Walter cared very little for this adventure.  It certainly annoyed him a
little, and it showed him that some of the others in his dormitory must
be more or less brutes, if they could find it amusing to break the sleep
and play on the fears of a new boy the very night of his arrival among
them.  But he thought no more about it, and was quite determined that it
should not happen often.

Far different was the case with poor little Arthur Eden, another new
boy, who, as Walter had observed, occupied the bed next to him.  He had
been roused from his first sweet sleep in the same way, about the same
time as Walter.  But no one had prepared him for this annoyance, and as
he was a very timid child, it filled him with terror; he was even so
terrified that he did not know what it was.  He lay quite still, not
daring to speak, or make a sound, only clinging to his mattress with
both hands in an agony of dread.  He was already worn and bewildered
with the events of the day.  He had fallen amongst the Philistines; at
the very moment of his arrival he had got into bad hands, the hands of
boys who made sport of his weakness, corrupted his feelings, and
lacerated his heart.  He was very young--a mere child of twelve--and in
the innocence of his simplicity he had unreservedly answered all their
questions, and prattled to them about his home, about his twin sister,
about nearly all his cherished secrets.  In that short space of time he
had afforded materials enough for the coarse jeers of the brutal, and
the poignant ridicule of the cruel for many a long day.  Something of
this derision had begun already, and he had found no secret place to
hide his tears.  That they would call him a milksop, a molly-coddle, and
all kinds of horrid names, he knew, and he had tried manfully to bear-up
under persecution.  It was not until after many hot and silent drops had
relieved the fever of his overwrought brain, that sleep had come to him,
and now it was broken thus.

O parents and guardians--anxious, yet unwise class--why, tell me why,
knowing all that you must know, do you send such children as this to
school?  Eden's mother, indeed, had opposed the step, but his guardian
(for the boy's father was dead), seeing that he was being spoilt at
home, and that he was naturally a shrinking and timid lad, had urged
that he should be sent to Saint Winifred's, with some vague notion of
making a man of him.  He might as well have thrown a piece of Brussels
lace into the fire with the intention of changing it into open
iron-work.  The proper place for little Eden would have been some
country parsonage, where care and kindliness might have gradually helped
him, as he grew older, to acquire the faculties which he had not;
whereas, in this case, a public school only impaired for a time in that
tender frame the bright yet delicate qualities which he had.

The big, clumsy ne'er-do-well of a boy, Cradock by name, who was choking
with secret laughter as he tilted little Eden's bed--leaving a pause of
frightful suspense now and then to let him recover breath and realise
his situation--was as raw and ill-trained a fellow as you like, but he
had nothing in him wilfully or diabolically wicked.  If he had been
similarly treated he would have broken into a great guffaw, and emptied
his water-jug over the intruder; and yet if he could have seen the new
boy at that moment, he would have seen that pretty little face--only
meant as yet for the smiles of childhood--white with an almost idiotic
terror, and he would have caught a staring and meaningless look in the
glassy eyes which were naturally so bright and blue.  But he really did
not know--being merely an overgrown stupid fellow--the mischief he was
doing, and the absolute horrible torment that his jest (?) was
inflicting.

Finding that his joltings produced no apparent effect, and thinking that
Eden might, by some strange somnolence peculiar to new boys, sleep
through it all, he tilted the bed a little too high, and then indeed a
wild shriek rang through the room as the mattress and clothes tumbled
right over at the foot of the bed, and flung the child violently on the
floor.  Fortunately the heap of bed-clothes prevented him from being
much hurt, and Cradock had just time to pick him up and huddle him into
bed again, and jump back into his own bed, when the lamp of one of the
masters, who had been attracted by Eden's cry, appeared through the
door.  The master, finding all quiet, and having come from a distant
room, supposed that his ears had deceived him, or that the cry was some
accidental noise outside the building.  He merely walked round the room,
and seeing Eden's bed-clothes rather tumbled, kindly helped the
trembling child to replace them in a more comfortable order, and left
the room.

"I say, that's quite enough for one night," said the voice of one of the
boys, when the master had disappeared.  "You new fellows can go to
sleep.  Nobody'll touch you again to-night."  The speaker was Franklin,
rather a scapegrace in some respects, but a boy of no unkindly nature.

The light and the noise had revealed to Walter something of what must
have taken place.  In his own case, he cared very little for the
assurance that he would not be molested again that night, feeling quite
sure that he could hold his own against anyone, and that his former
enemy, at any rate, would not be likely to assault him again.  But he
was very, very glad for poor little Eden's sake, having caught a
momentary glimpse of his scared and pitiable look.

Walter could not sleep for a long time, not till long after he heard
from the regular breathings of the others that they were all in deep
slumber.  For there were sounds which came from Eden's bed which
disturbed his heart with pity.  His feelings bled for the poor little
fellow, so young and fresh from home, a newcomer like himself, but
evidently so little accustomed to this roughness and so little able to
protect his own interests.  For a long time into the night he heard the
poor child crying and sobbing to himself, though he was clearly trying
to stifle the sound.  At last Walter could stand it no longer, and
feeling sure that the rest were sound asleep, he whispered in his
kindest tone, for he didn't know his neighbour's name--

"I say, you little new fellow."

The sound of sobbing was hushed for a moment, but the boy seemed afraid
to answer; so Walter said again--"Are you awake?"

"Yes," said a weak, childish voice.

"Don't be afraid; I'm a new fellow, too.  Tell me your name."

"Eden," he whispered tremulously, though reassured by the kindly tone of
voice.  "Hush! hush! you'll awake someone."

"No, I won't," said Walter.  "Here, I'll come and speak to you;" and
stepping noiselessly out of bed, he whispered in Eden's ear, "Never
mind, my poor little fellow; don't be frightened; the boy didn't mean to
hurt you; he was only shoving your bed up and down for a joke.  Someone
did the same to me, so I jumped up and licked him with a slipper."

"But I got so frightened.  Oh, do you think they'll do it again
to-night?"

"No, certainly, not again to-night," said Walter; "they're all asleep;
and if anyone does it again another night, you must just slip out of bed
and not mind it.  It doesn't hurt."

"Thank you," whispered Eden; "you're very kind, and nobody else has been
kind to me here.  Will you tell me _your_ name?"

"My name's Walter Evson.  Do you know, your voice and look remind me of
my little brother.  There," he said, tucking him up in bed, "now
good-night, and go to sleep."

The little fellow pressed Walter's hand hard, said good-night, and soon
forgot his misery in a sleep of pure weariness.  I do not think that he
would have slept at all that night, but for the comforting sense that he
had found, to lean upon, a stronger nature and a stronger character than
his own.  Walter heard him breathing peacefully, and then he too fell
asleep, and neither woke nor dreamt (that he was aware of), until
half-past seven the next morning, when a servant roused the boys by
ringing a large hand-bell in their ears.



CHAPTER FIVE.

SCHOOL TROUBLES.

  The sorrows of thy youthful day Shall make thee wise in coming years!
  The brightest rainbows ever play Above the fountains of our tears.

  Mackay.

Walter jumped up and began to dress at once; Eden, still looking pale
and frightened, soon followed his example, and recognised him with a
smile of gratitude.  None of the other five boys who occupied the room
thought of stirring until the chapel-bell began to ring, which left them
the ample space of a quarter of an hour for their orisons, ablutions,
and all other necessary preparations!

Walter, who was now half-dressed, glanced at them as they got up, to
discover the owner of the slipper, which he still kept in his
possession.  He watched for the one-sandalled enemy as eagerly as Pelias
may be supposed to have done.  First Jones tumbled out of bed, not even
deigning a surly recognition, but Jones had his right complement of
slippers.  Then two other fellows, named Anthony and Franklin, not quite
so big as Jones; their slippers were all right.  Then Cradock, who
looked a little shyly at Eden, and, after a while, told him that he was
only playing a joke the night before, and was sorry for having
frightened him; and last, Harpour, the biggest of the lot.  Harpour was
one of those fellows who are to be found in every school, and who are
always dangerous characters: a huge boy, very low down in the forms,
very strong, very stupid in work, rather good-looking, generally cut by
the better sort, unredeemed by any natural taste or accomplishment,
wholly without influence except among little boys (whom he alternately
bullied and spoilt), and only kept at school by his friends, because
they were rather afraid of him, and did not quite know what to do with
him.  They called it "keeping him out of mischief," but the mischief he
did at school was a thousandfold greater than any which he could have
done elsewhere; for, except at school, he would have been comparatively
powerless to do any positive harm.

By the exhaustive process of reasoning, Walter had already concluded
that Harpour must have been his nocturnal disturber; and, accordingly,
after thrusting a foot into a slipper, Harpour began to exclaim, "Hallo!
where's my other slipper?  Confound it, I shall be late; I can't dress;
where's my other slipper?"

Wishing to leave him without escape from the necessity of betraying
himself to have been the author of last night's raid, Walter made no
sign, until Harpour, who had not any time to lose, said to him--

"Hi! you new chap, have you got my slipper?"

"I've got _a_ slipper," said Walter, blandly.

"The deuce you have.  Then give it here, this minute."

"I captured it off someone's leg, who was under my bed last night," said
Walter, giving it into Harpour's hand.

"The deuce you did!"

"Yes; and I smacked the fellow with it, as I will do again, if he comes
again."

"The deuce you will!  Then take that for your impudence," said Harpour,
intending to bring down the slipper on his shoulder; but Walter dodged
down, and parrying the blow with his arm, sent the slipper in a graceful
parabola across the wash-hand-stand into Jones's basin.

"So, so," said Harpour, "_you're_ a pretty cool hand, you are!  Well,
I've no time to settle accounts with you now, or I should be late for
chapel.  But--"

A significant pantomime explained the remainder of the sentence, and
then Harpour, standing in his one slipper, hastily adjourned to his
toilet.  Walter, being dressed in good time, knelt down for a few
moments of hearty prayer, helped poor Eden, who was as helpless as
though he had been always dressed by a servant, to finish dressing, and
ran across the court into the chapel just as the bell stopped.  There
were still two minutes before the door was shut, and he occupied them by
watching the boys as they streamed in, many of them with their
waistcoats only half buttoned, and others with the water-drops still
dangling from their hastily combed hair.  He saw Tracy saunter in very
neat, but with a languid air of disapprobation, blushing withal as he
entered; Eden, whose large eyes looked bewildered until he caught sight
of Walter and sat down beside him; Kenrick, beaming as ever, who nodded
to him as he passed by; Henderson, who, notwithstanding the time and
place, found opportunity to whisper to him a hope that he had washed his
desirable person in clear water; Plumber looking as if his credulity had
been gorged beyond endurance; Daubeny, with eyes immovably fixed in the
determination to know his lessons that day; and lastly, Harpour, who had
just time to scuffle in hot, breathless, and exceedingly untidy, as the
chaplain began the opening sentence.

"Where am I to go now?" asked Eden, when chapel was over.

"Well, Eden, I know as little as you.  You'd better ask your tutor.
Here, Kenrick," said Walter, "which of those black gowns is Mr
Robertson?--this fellow's tutor and mine."

Kenrick pointed out one of the masters, to whom Eden went; and then
Walter asked, "Where am I to go to Mr Paton's form?"

"Here, let me lead the victim to the sacrifice," said Henderson.  "O for
a wreath of cypress or funeral yew, or--"

"Nettles?" suggested Kenrick.

"Observe, new boy," said Henderson, "your eternal friend's delicate
insinuation that you are a donkey.  Here, come with me and I'll take you
to be patted on."  Henderson's exuberant spirits prevented his ever
speaking without giving vent to slang, bad puns, or sheer good-humoured
nonsense.

"Aren't you in that form, Kenrick?" asked Walter, as he saw him
diverging to the right.

"Oh no! dear me, no!" said Henderson.  "_I_ am, but the eternal friend
is at least two forms higher; he, let me tell you, is a star of no
ordinary magnitude; he's in the Thicksides"--meaning the Thucydides'
class.  "You'll require no end of sky-climbing before you reach _his_
altitude.  And now, victim, behold your sacrificial priest," he said,
placing Walter at the end of a table among some thirty boys who were
seated in front of a master's desk in the large schoolroom, in various
parts of which other forms were also beginning work under similar
superintendence.  When all the forms were saying lessons at the same
time it may be imagined that the room was not very still, and that a
master required good lungs who had to teach and talk there for hours.

Not that Mr Paton's form contributed very much to the quota of general
noise.  Although Henderson had chaffed Daubeny on his virtuous
stillness, yet all the boys sat very nearly as quiet as Dubbs himself
during school hours.  Even Henderson and such mercurial spirits were
awed into silence and sobriety.  You would hardly have known that in
that quarter of the room there _was_ a form at all.  Quicksilver itself
would have lost its volatility under Mr Paton's manipulation.

It was hard at first sight to say why this was.  Certainly Mr Paton set
many punishments, but so did other masters, who had not half his
success.  The secret was that Mr Paton was something of a _routinier_,
and that was the word which, if he had known it, Kenrick would have used
to describe him.  If he set an imposition, the imposition must be done,
and must be done at a certain time, without appeal, and _causa indicta_.
Mr Paton was as deaf as Pluto to all excuses, and as inexorable as
Rhadamanthus in his retributive dispensations.  Neither Orpheus nor
Amphion would have moved him.  Orpheus might have made all the desks and
forms dance round as they listened to his song, but he could never have
got Mr Paton to let off fifty lines; and Amphion would have been
equally unsuccessful even if the walls of the court had come as
petitioners in obedience to his strains.  As for remitting a lesson, Mr
Paton would not have done it if Saint Cecilia had offered him the whole
wreath of red and white roses which the admiring angels twined in her
golden hair.

Mr Paton's rule was not the leaden rule of Lesbos [Aristophanes, Nic.
Eth., v. 14.]; it could not be bent to suit the diversities of
individual character, but was a rule iron and inflexible, which applied
equally to all.  His measure was that of Procrustes; the cleverest boys
could not stretch themselves beyond it, the dullest were mechanically
pulled into its dimensions.  Hence some fared hardly under it; yet let
me hasten to say that, on the whole, with the great number of average
boys, it was a success.  The discipline which he established was
perfect, and though many boys winced under it at the time, it was
valuable to all of them, especially to those of an idle or sluggish
tendency; and as it was rigid just as well as severe, they often learned
to look back upon it with gratitude and respect.

After a time the form went up to say a lesson.  Each boy was put on in
turn.  When it came to Walter's turn Mr Paton first inquired his name,
which he entered with extreme neatness in his class-book--a book in
which there was not a single blot from the first page to the last.  He
then put him on as he had put on the rest.

"I had no book, sir, and didn't know what the lesson was," said Walter.

"Excuses, sir, excuses!" said Mr Paton sternly.  "You mean that you
haven't learnt the lesson."

"Yes, sir."

"A bad beginning, Evson; bring me no excuses in future.  You must write
the lesson out."  And an ominous entry implying this fact was written by
Walter's freshly-entered name.  Most men would have excused the first
punishment, and contented themselves with a word of admonition; but this
wasn't Mr Paton's way.  He held with Escalus that--

  "Mercy is not itself that oft looks so!
  Pardon is still the nurse of second woe."

  [Measure for Measure, act two, scene 1.]

Now it happened that Walter hated excuses, and had always looked on them
as first cousins to lies, and he determined never again to render to Mr
Paton any reason which could by any possibility be construed into an
excuse.  He therefore had to undergo a large amount of punishment, which
he flattered himself could not by any possibility have been avoided.

On this occasion Henderson was also turned, and with him a boy named
Bliss.  It was quite impossible for Henderson to be unemployed on some
nonsense, and heedless of the fact that he was himself Bliss's companion
in misfortune, he opened a poetry-book, and taking Lycidas as his model,
sat unusually still, while he occupied himself in composing a "Lament
for Blissidas," beginning pathetically--

  "Poor Blissidas is turned; turned ere his prime
  Young Blissidas, and hath not left his peer;
  Who would not weep for Blissidas?  He knew
  Himself to say his Rep.--but give him time--
  He must not quaff his glass of watery beer
  Unchaffed, or write, his paper ruled and lined,
  Without the meed of some melodious jeer."

"I'll lick you, Flip, after school," said the wrathful Bliss, shaking
his fist, as Henderson began to whisper to him this monody.

"Why do they call you Flip?" asked Walter laughing.

"Short for Flibberty-gibbet," said Bliss.

"Bliss, Henderson, and Evson, do me two hundred lines each," said Mr
Paton; and so on this, his first morning in school, a second punishment
was entered against Walter's name.

"Whew-w-w... abomination of... spoken of by... hush!" was Henderson's
whispered comment.  "I call that hard lines."  But he continued his
"Lament for Blissidas" notwithstanding, introducing Saint Winifred and
other mourners over Bliss's fate, and ending with the admonition that in
writing the lines he was--

  "To touch the tender tops of various quills,
  And mind and dot his quaint enamelled i's."

When Walter asked his tutor for the paper on which to write his
punishment, Mr Robertson said to him, "Already, Evson!" in a tone of
displeasure, and with a sarcasm hardly inferior to that of Talleyrand's
celebrated "Deja."  "Two hundred lines and a lesson to write out
_already_!"  Bitter; with no sign of sympathy, without one word of
inquiry, of encouragement for the future, or warning about the past; no
advice given, no interest shown; no wonder that Walter never got on with
his tutor.

The days that began for Walter from this time were days of darkness and
disappointment.  He was not deficient in natural ability, but he had
undergone no special training for Saint Winifred's School, and
consequently many things were new to him in which other boys had been
previously trained.  The practice of learning grammar by means of Latin
rules was particularly trying to him.  He could have easily mastered the
facts which the rules were intended to impress, but the empirical
process suggested for arriving at the facts he could not remember, even
if he could have construed the crabbed Latin in which it was conveyed.
His father, too, had never greatly cultivated his powers of memory, and
hence he felt serious difficulty at first with the long lessons that had
to be learnt by heart.

Mr Paton's system was simply this.  If a boy failed in a lesson from
any mundane cause whatever, he had to write it out; if he failed to
bring it written out, he had to write it twice; if he was turned in a
second lesson he was sent to detention, _i.e._, he was kept in during
play hours; if this process was long-continued he was sent to the
headmaster in disgrace, and ran the chance of being flogged as an
incorrigible idler.  Mr Paton, who was devoted to a system, made no
allowance for difference of ability, or for idiosyncrasies of
temperament; he was a truly good man, at bottom a really kind-hearted
man, and a genuine Christian; but the system which he had adopted was
his "idol of the cave," and, as we said before, the _Kavwv molubdinos_
was unknown to him.

Now, the way the system worked on Walter was this: he failed in lessons
because they were so new to him that he found it impossible to master
them.  He was not accustomed to work in such a crowded and noisy place
as the great schoolroom, and the early hour for going to bed left little
time for evening work.  Accordingly he often failed, and whenever he
did, the impositions, or detentions, or both, took away from his
available time for mastering his difficulties, and as this necessitated
fresh failures, every single punishment became frightfully accumulative,
and, alas! before three weeks were over, Walter was "sent up for bad" to
the headmaster.  By this he felt degraded and discouraged to the last
degree.  Moreover, harm was done to him in many other ways.  Conscious
that all this disgrace had come upon him without any serious fault of
his own, and even in spite of his direct and strenuous efforts, he
became oppressed with a sense of injustice and undeserved persecution.
The apparent uselessness of every attempt to shake himself free from
these trammels of routine rendered him desperate and reckless, and the
serious diminution of his hours for play and exercise made him
dispirited and out-of-sorts.  And all this brought on a bitter fit of
homesickness, during which he often thought of writing home and
imploring to be removed from the school, or even of taking his
deliverance into his own hands, and running away himself.  But he knew
that his father and mother were already distressed beyond measure to
hear of the mill-round of punishment and discredit into which he had
fallen, and about which he frankly informed them; so for their sakes he
determined to bear-up a little longer.

Walter was getting a bad name as an idler, and was fast losing his
self-respect.  And when that sheet-anchor is once lost, anything may
happen to the ship; however gay its trim, however taut its sides,
however delicate and beautiful the curve of its prow, it may drive
before the gale, it may be dashed pitilessly among the iron rocks, or
stranded hopelessly upon the harbour bar.  A little more of this
discipline, and a boy naturally noble-hearted and capable, might have
been transformed into a mere moon-calf, like poor Plumber, or a cruel
and vicious bully, like Harpour or Jones.

Happily our young Walter was saved by other influences from losing his
self-respect.  He was saved from it by one or two kindly and genial
friendships; by success in other lines, and by the happy consciousness
that his presence at Saint Winifred's was a help and comfort to some who
needed such assistance with sore need.

One afternoon he was sitting disconsolately on a bench which ran along a
blank wall on one side of the court, doing absolutely nothing.  He was
too disgusted with the world and with himself even to take up a novel.
It was three o'clock, and the court was deserted for the playground, as
a match had been announced that afternoon between the sixth-form and the
school, at which all but a very few (who never did anything but loaf
about), were either playing or looking on.  To sit with his head bent
down, on a bench in an empty court doing nothing while a game was going
on, was very unlike the Walter Evson of six weeks before; but at that
moment Walter was weary of detention, which was just over; he was
burdened with punishments, he was half sick for want of exercise, and he
was too much out of spirits to do anything.  Kenrick and Henderson had
noticed and lamented the change in him.  Not exactly knowing the causes
of his ill-success, they were astonished to find so apparently clever a
boy taking his place among the sluggards and dunces.  With this,
however, they concerned themselves less than with the settled gloom
which was falling over him, and which rendered him much less available
when they wanted to refresh themselves by talking a little nonsense, or
amusing themselves in any other way.  On this day, guessing how it was
likely to be, Kenrick had proposed not to join the game until detention
was over, and then to make Evson come up and play; and Henderson had
kindly offered to stay with him, and add his persuasions to his
friend's.

As they came out ready dressed for football, they caught sight of him.

"Come along, old fellow; you're surely going to fight for the school
against the sixth," said Kenrick.

"Isn't it too late?"

"No; anyone is allowed a quarter of an hour's grace."

"Excuse number one bowled down," said Henderson.

"But I'm not dressed; I shan't have time to put on my Jersey."

"Never mind, you'll only want your cap and belt, and can play in your
shirt-sleeves."

"There goes excuse number two; so cut along," said Henderson, "and get
your belt.  We'll wait for you here.  Why, the eternal friend's getting
as wasted with misery as the daughter of Babylon," said Henderson, as
Walter ran off.

"Yes," said Kenrick.  "I don't like to see that glum look instead of the
merry face he came with.  Never mind; the game'll do him good; I never
saw such a player; he looks just like the British lion when he gets into
the middle of the fray; plunges at everything, and shakes his mane.
Here he is; come along."

They ran up and found a hotly-contested game swaying to and fro between
the goals; and Walter, who was very active and a first-rate runner, was
soon in the thick of it.  As the evenness of the match grew more
apparent the players got more and more excited.  It had been already
played several times, and no base had been kicked, except once by each
side, when the scale had been turned by a heavy wind.  Hence they
exhibited the greatest eagerness, as school and sixth alike held it a
strong point of honour to win, and a shout of approval greeted any
successful catch or vigorous kick.

Whenever the ball was driven beyond the bounds, it was kicked straight
in, generally a short distance only, and the players on both sides
struggled for it as it fell.  During one of these momentary pauses
Kenrick whispered to Walter, "I say, Evson, next time it's driven
outside I'll try to get it, and if you'll stand just beyond the crowd
I'll kick it to you, and you can try a run."

"Thanks," said Walter eagerly, "I'll do my best."  The opportunity soon
occurred.  Kenrick ran for the ball; a glance showed him where Walter
was standing; he kicked it with precision, and not too high, so that
there was no time for the rest to watch where it was likely to descend.
Walter caught it, and before the others could recover from their
surprise, was off like an arrow.  Of course, the whole of the opposite
side were upon him in a moment, and he had to be as quick as a deer, and
as wary as a cat.  But now his splendid running came in, and he was,
besides, rather fresher than the rest.  He dodged, he made wide detours,
he tripped some and sprang past others, he dived under arms and through
legs, he shook off every touch, wrenched himself free from one capturer
by leaving in his hands the whole shoulder of his shirt, and got nearer
and nearer to the goal.  At last he saw that there was one part of the
field comparatively undefended; in this direction he darted like
lightning--charged and spilt, by the vehemence of his impulse, two
fellows who stood with outstretched arms to stop him--seized the
favourable instant, and by a swift and clever drop-kick, sent the ball
flying over the bar amid deafening cheers, just as half the other side
flung him down and precipitated themselves over his body.

The run was so brilliant and so plucky, and the last burst so splendid,
that even the defeated side could hardly forbear to cheer him.  As for
the conquerors, their enthusiasm knew no bounds; they shook Walter by
the hand, patted him on the back, clapped him, and at last lifted him on
their shoulders for general inspection.  As yet he was known to very
few, and "Who's that nice-looking little fellow who got the school a
base?" was a question which was heard on every side.

"That's Evson; Evson; Evson, a new fellow," answered Kenrick, Henderson,
and all who knew him, as fast as they could, in reply to the general
queries.  They were proud to know him just then, and this little triumph
occurred in the nick of time to raise poor Walter in his own estimation.

"Thanks, Kenrick, thanks," he said, warmly grasping his friend's hand,
as they left the field.  "They ought to have cheered _you_, not me, for
if it hadn't been for you I should not have got that base."

"Pooh!" was the answer; "I couldn't have got it myself under any
circumstances; and even if I could, it is at least as much pleasure to
me that _you_ should have done it."

Of all earthly spectacles few are more beautiful, and in some respects
more touching, than a friendship between two boys, unalloyed by any
taint of selfishness, indiscriminating in its genuine enthusiasm,
delicate in its natural reserve.  It is not always because the hearts of
men are wiser, purer, or better than the hearts of boys, that "summae
puerorum amicitia: saepe cum toga deponuntur."



CHAPTER SIX.

A BURST OF WILFULNESS.

  --Nunquamne reponam
  Vexatus toties?

  Juvenal i. i.

Although Walter's football triumphs prevented him from losing
self-respect and sinking into wretchlessness or desperation, they did
not save him from his usual arrears of punishment and extra work.
Besides this, it annoyed him bitterly to be always, and in spite of all
effort, bottom, or nearly bottom, of his form.  He knew that this
grieved and disappointed his parents nearly as much as himself, and he
feared that they would not understand the reason which, in his case,
rendered it excusable--viz., the enormous amount of purely routine work
for which other boys had been prepared by previous training, and in
which, under his present discouragements and inconveniences, he felt it
impossible to recover ground.  It was hard to be below boys to whom he
knew himself to be superior in every intellectual quality; it was hard
for a boy really clever and lively, to be set down at once as an idler
and dunce.  And it made Walter very miserable.  For meanwhile Mr Paton
had taken quite a wrong view of his character.  He answered so well at
times, construed so happily, and showed such bright flashes of
intelligence and interest in parts of his work, that Mr Paton, making
no allowances for new methods and an untrained memory, set him down, by
an error of judgment, as at once able and obstinate, capable of doing
excellently, and wilfully refusing to do so.  This was a phase of
character which always excited his indignation; and it was for the boy's
own sake that he set himself to correct it, if possible.  On both sides,
therefore, there was some misunderstanding, and a consequent
exacerbation of mind which told injuriously on their daily intercourse.

Walter's vexation and misery reached its acme on the receipt by his
father of his first school character, which document his father sent
back for Walter's own perusal, with a letter which, if not actually
reproachful, was at least uneasy and dissatisfied in tone.

For the character itself Walter cared little, knowing well that it was
founded throughout on misapprehension; but his father's letter stirred
the very depths of his heart, and made them turbid with passion and
sorrow.  He received it at dinner-time, and read it as he went across
the court to the detention-room, of which he was now so frequent an
occupant.  It was a bright September day, and he longed to be out at
some game, or among the hills, or on the shore.  Instead of that, he was
doomed for his failures to two long weary hours of mechanical
pen-driving, of which the results were torn up when the two hours were
over.  He had had no exercise for the last week; all his spare time had
been taken up with impositions; Mr Robertson had given him a severe and
angry lecture that morning; even Mr Paton, who rarely used strong
language, had called him intolerable and incorrigible, and had
threatened a second report to the headmaster, because this was the tenth
successive Greek grammar lesson in which he had failed.  Added to all
this, he was suffering from headache and lassitude.  And now his
father's letter was the cumulus of his misfortunes.  A rebellious,
indignant, and violent spirit rose in him.  Was he always, for no fault
of his own, to be bullied, baited, driven, misunderstood, and crushed in
this way?  If it was of no use trying to be good, and to do his duty,
how would it do to try the other experiment--to fling off the trammels
of duty and principle altogether; to do all those things which
inclination suggested and the moral sense forbade; to enjoy himself; to
declare himself on the side of pleasure and self-indulgence?  Certainly
this would save him from much unpleasantness and annoyance in many ways.
He was young, vigorous, active; he might easily make himself more
popular than he was with the boys; and as for the authorities, do what
he would, it appeared that he could hardly be in worse disrepute than
now.  Vice bade high: as he thought of it all, his pen flew faster, and
his pulse seemed to send the blood bounding through his veins as he
tightened the grasp of his left-hand round the edge of the desk.

Hitherto the ideal which he had set before him, as the standard to be
attained during his school-life, had been one in which a successful
devotion to duty, and a real effort to attain to "godliness and good
learning," had borne the largest share.  But on this morning a very
different ideal rose before him; he would abandon all interest in school
work, and only aim at being a gay, high-spirited boy, living solely for
pleasure, amusement, and self-indulgence.  There were many such around
him--heroes among their schoolfellows, popular, applauded, and proud.
Sin seemed to sit lightly and gracefully upon them.  Endowed as he was
with every gift of person and appearance, to this condition at least he
felt that he could easily attain.  It was an ideal not, alas! unnatural
to the perilous age:

  "Which claims for manhood's vice the privilege
  Of boyhood--when young Dionysius seems
  All joyous as he burst upon the East
  A jocund and a welcome conqueror;
  And Aphrodite, sweet as from the sea
  She rose, and floated in her pearly shell
  A laughing girl; when lawless will erects
  Honour's gay temple on the Mount of God,
  And meek obedience bears the coward's brand;
  While Satan in celestial panoply
  With Sin, his lady, smiling by his side,
  Defies all heaven to arms."

Yes; he would follow the multitude to do all the evil which he saw being
done around him; it looked a joyous and delightful prospect.  He gazed
on the bright vision of sin, on the iridescent waters of pleasure; and
did not know that the brightness was a mirage of the burning desert, the
iridescence a film of corruption over a stagnant pool.

The letter from home was his chief stumbling-block.  He loved his father
and mother with almost passionate devotion; he clung to his home with an
intensity of concentrated love.  He really had tried to please them, and
to do his best; but yet they didn't seem to give him credit for it.
Look at this cold reproachful letter; it maddened him to think of it.

There was only one thing which checked him.  It was a little voice,
which had been more silent lately, because other and passionate tones
were heard more loudly; but yet even from a child poor Walter had been
accustomed to listen with reverence to its admonitions.  It was a voice
behind him saying--"This is the way, walk ye in it," now that he was
turning aside to the right-hand or to the left.  But the noble accents
in which it whispered of patience were drowned just now in the clamorous
turbulence of those other voices of appeal.

The two hours of detention were over, and the struggle was over too.
Walter drew his pen with a fierce and angry scrawl over the lines he had
written, showed them up to the master in attendance with a careless and
almost impudent air, and was hardly out of the room before he gave a
shout of emancipation and defiance.  Impatience and passion had won the
day.

He ran up to the playground as hard as he could tear to work off the
excitement of his spirits, and get rid of the inward turmoil.  On a
grass bank at the far end of it he saw two boys seated, whom he knew at
once to be Henderson and Kenrick, who, for a wonder, were reading, not
green novels, but Shakespeare!

"I'll tell you what it is, Henderson," he said; "I _can't_ and I _won't_
stand this any longer.  It's the last detention breaks the boy's back.
I hate Saint Winifred's, I hate Dr Lane, I hate Robertson, and I _hate,
hate, hate_ Paton!" he said, stamping angrily.

"Hooroop!" said Henderson; "so the patient Evson is on fire at last.
Tell it not to Dubbs."

"Why, Walter, what's all this about?" asked Kenrick.

"Why, Ken," said Walter, more quietly, "here's a history of my life:
Greek grammar, lines, detention, caning--caning, detention, lines, Greek
grammar.  I'm sick of it; I _can't_ and I _won't_ stand it any more."

"Whether," spouted Henderson, from the volume on his knee--

  "`Whether 'twere nobler for the mind to suffer
  The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
  Or to take arms against a sea of troubles.
  And by opposing end them!'"

"End them I will," said Walter; "somehow, I'll pay him out, depend upon
it."

"Recte si possis si non quocunque modo," said Somers, the head of the
school, whose fag Walter was, and who, passing by at the moment, caught
the last sentence; "what is the excitement among you small boys?"

"The old story--pitching into Paton," said Kenrick indifferently, and
rather contemptuously; for he was a _protege_ of Somers, and felt
annoyed that he should see Walter's unreasonable display, the more so as
Somers had asked him already, "why he was so much with that idle new
fellow who was always being placed lag in his form?"

"What's it all about?" asked Somers of Kenrick.

"Because he gets lines for missing his grammar, I suppose."  There was
something in the tone which was especially offensive to Walter; for it
sounded as if Kenrick wanted to show him the cold shoulder before his
_great_ friend, the head of the school.

"Oh, _that_ all?  Well, my dear fellow, the remedy's easy; work at it a
little harder;" and Somers walked on, humming a tune.

"I wonder what he calls _harder_," said Walter, shaking his fist; "when
I first came I used to get up quite early in the morning, and learn it
till I was half-stupid; I wonder whether he ever did as much?"

"Well, but it's no good abusing Paton," said Kenrick; "of course, if you
don't know the lesson, he concludes you haven't learnt it."

"Thank you for nothing, Kenrick," said Walter curtly; "come along,
Flip."

Kenrick was vexed; he was conscious of having shown a little coolness
and want of sympathy; and he looked anxiously after Henderson and Walter
as they walked away.

Presently he started up, and ran after them.  "Don't be offended,
Walter, my boy," he said, seizing his hand.  "I didn't mean to be cold
just now; but, really, I don't see why you should be so very wrathful
with Paton; what can a master do if one fails in a lesson two or three
times running? he must punish one, I suppose."

"Hang Paton," said Walter, shaking off his hand rather angrily, for he
was now thoroughly out of temper.

"O, very well, Evson," said Kenrick, whose chief fault was an intense
pride, which took fire on the least provocation, and which made him take
umbrage at the slightest offence; "catch me making an advance to you
again.  Henderson, you left your book on the grass;" and turning on his
heel, he walked slowly away--heavy at heart, for he liked Walter better
than any other boy in the school, and was half ashamed to break with him
about such a trifle.

Henderson, apart from his somewhat frivolous and nonsensical tone, was a
well-meaning fellow.  When he was walking with Walter, he had intended
to chaff him about his sudden burst of ill-temper, and jest away his
spirit of revenge; but he saw that poor Walter was in no mood for jokes,
and he quite lacked the moral courage to give good advice in a sober or
serious way, or to recommend any course _because_ it was right.  This,
at present, was beyond Henderson's standard of good, so he left Walter
and went back for his book.

And Walter, flinging into the schoolroom, found several spirits seven
times more wicked than himself, and fed the fire of his wrath with the
fuel of unbounded abuse, mockery, and scorn of Mr Paton, in which he
was heartily abetted by the others, who hailed all indications that
Walter was likely to become one of themselves.  And that evening,
instead of attempting to get up any of his work, Walter wasted the whole
time of preparation in noise, folly, and turbulence; for which he was
duly punished by the master on duty.

He got up next morning breathing, with a sense of defiance and
enjoyment, his new atmosphere of self-will.  He, of course, broke down
utterly, more utterly than ever, in his morning lessons, and got a
proportionately longer imposition.  Going back to his place, he
purposely flung down his books on the desk, one after another with a
bang; and for each book which he had flung down, Mr Paton gave him a
hundred lines, whereupon he laughed sarcastically, and got two hundred
more.  Conscious that the boys were watching with some amusement this
little exhibition of temper and trial of wills, he then took out a sheet
of paper, wrote on it, in large letters, the words Two Hundred Lines for
Mr Paton, and, amid the tittering of the form, carried it up to Mr
Paton's desk.

This was the most astoundingly impudent and insubordinate act which had
ever been done to Mr Paton for years, and it was now his turn to be
angry.  But mastering his anger with admirable determination, he merely
said, "Evson, you must be beside yourself this morning; it is very
rarely, indeed, that a new boy is so far gone in disobedience as this.
I have no hesitation in saying that you are the most audacious and
impertinent new boy with whom I have ever had to deal.  I must cane you
in my room after detention, to which you will of course go."

"Thank you, sir," said Walter, with a smile of impudent _sang froid_;
and the form tittered again as he walked noisily to his seat.  But Mr
Paton, allowing for his violent frame of mind, took no notice of this
last affront.

Whereupon Walter, taking another large piece of paper, and a spluttering
quill pen, wrote on it, with a great deal of scratching--

  Due from Evson to Mr Paton.

  For missing lesson... 100 lines.
  For laying down books... 300 lines.
  For laughing... 200 lines.
  For writing 200 lines...  A caning.

  Detention, of course.  Thank you for nothing.

And on the other side of the sheet he wrote in large letters--"No Go!"
Which, being done, he passed the sheet along the form _pour encourager
les autres_.

"Evson," said Mr Paton, quietly, "bring me that paper."

Walter took it up--looking rather alarmed this time--but with the side
"_No go_!" uppermost.

"What is this, Evson?"

"Number ninety, sir," said Walter, amid the now unconcealed laughter of
the rest, who knew very well that he had intended it for "No go."

Mr Paton looked curiously at Walter for a minute, and then said,
"Evson, Evson, I could not have thought you so utterly foolish.  Well,
you know that each fresh act _must_ have its fresh punishment.  You must
leave the room now, and _besides all your other punishments_ I must also
report you to the headmaster.  You can best judge with what result."

This was a mistake of Mr Paton's--a mistake of judgment only--for which
he cannot be blamed.  But it was a disastrous mistake.  Had he been at
all a delicate judge or reader of the phenomena of character, he would
have observed at once that at that moment there was a wild spirit of
anger, a rankling sense of injustice and persecution in Walter's heart,
which no amount of punishment could have cowed.  Walter just then might
without the least difficulty have been goaded into some act of violence
which would have rendered expulsion from the school an unavoidable
consequence.  So easy is it to petrify the will, to make a boy bad in
spite of himself, and to spoil, with no intentions but those of
kindliness and justice, the promise of a fair young life.  For when the
will has once been suffered to grow rigid by obstinacy--a result which
is very easy to avoid--no power on earth can bend it _at the time_.  Had
Mr Paton sent Walter out of the room before; had he at the end said,
"Evson, you are not yourself to-day, and I forgive you," Walter would
have been in a moment as docile and as humble as a child.  But as it
was, he left the room quite coolly, with a sneer on his lips, and banged
the door; yet the next moment, when he found himself in the court alone,
unsupported by the countenance of those who enjoyed his rebelliousness,
he seated himself on a bench in the courtyard, hung his head on his
breast, and burst into a flood of tears.  If any friend could have seen
him at that moment, or spoken one word in season, how much pain the poor
boy might have been saved!  Kenrick happened to cross the court; the
moment Walter caught sight of him he sat with head erect and arms
folded, but Kenrick was not to be deceived.  He had caught one glimpse
of Walter first; he saw his eyes wet with tears, and knew that he was in
trouble.  He hung on his foot doubtfully for one moment--but then his
pride came in; he remembered the little pettish repulse in the
playground the day before; the opportunity was lost, and he walked
slowly on.  And Walter's heart grew as hard within him as a stone.



CHAPTER SEVEN.

VOGUE LA GALERE.

  Ah!  Diamond, thou little knowest what mischief thou hast done.

  Life of Sir I. Newton.

That afternoon Mr Paton, going into the Combination Room, where the
masters often met, threw himself into one of the armchairs with an
unwonted expression of vexation and disgust on his usually placid
features.

"Why, what's the matter with you, Paton?" asked Mr Robertson.  "Is
to-day's _Times_ too liberal for your notions, or what?"

"No," said Mr Paton; "but I have just been caning Evson, a new boy, and
the fellow's stubborn obstinacy and unaccountable coolness annoy me
exceedingly."

"O yes; he's a pupil of mine, I'm sorry to say, and he has never been
free from punishment since he came.  Even your Procrustean rule seems to
fail with him, Paton.  What have you been obliged to cane him for?"

Mr Paton related Walter's escapade.

"Well, of course you had no choice but to cane him," replied his
colleague, "for such disobedience; but how did he take it?"

"In the oddest way possible.  He came in with punctilious politeness,
obviously assumed, with sarcastic intentions.  When I took up the cane
he stood with arms folded, and a singularly dogged look; in fact, his
manner disarmed me.  You know I detest caning, and I really could not do
it, never having had occasion for it for months together.  I gave him
two cuts, and then left off.  `May I go, sir?' he asked.  `Yes,' I said,
and he left the room with a bow and a `Thank you, sir.'  I am really
sorry for the boy; for as I was obliged to send him to Dr Lane, he will
probably get another flogging from him."

"What a worthless boy he must be," answered Mr Robertson.

"No, not exactly worthless; there's something about him I can't help
liking; but most impudent and stubborn."

"Excuse me," said Mr Percival, another of the masters, who had been
listening attentively to the conversation; "I humbly venture to think
that you're both mistaken in that boy.  I like him exceedingly, and
think him as promising a lad as any in the school.  I never knew any boy
behave more modestly and respectfully."

"Why, how do you know anything of him?" asked Mr Robertson in surprise.

"Only by accident.  I had once or twice noticed him among the _detenus_,
and being sorry to think that a new boy should be an _habitue_ of the
extra schoolroom, I asked him one day why he was sent.  He told me that
it was for failing in a lesson, and when I asked why he hadn't learnt
it, he said, very simply and respectfully, `I really did my very best,
sir; but it's all new work to me.'  Look at the boy's innocent, engaging
face, and you will be sure that he was telling me the truth.

"I'm afraid," continued Mr Percival, "you'll think this very slight
ground for setting my opinion against yours; but I was pleased with
Evson's manner, and asked him to come and take a stroll on the shore,
that I might know something more of him.  Do you know, I never found a
more intelligent companion.  He was all life and vivacity; it was quite
a pleasure to be with him.  Being new to the sea, he didn't know the
names of the commonest things on the shore, and if you had seen his face
light up as he kept picking up whelk's eggs, and mermaid's purses, and
zoophytes, and hermit-crabs, and bits of plocamium or coralline, and
asking me all I could tell him about them, you would not have thought
him a stupid or worthless boy."

"I don't know, Percival; _you_ are a regular conjuror.  All sorts of
ne'er-do-wells succeed under your manipulation.  You're a first-rate
hand at gathering grapes from thorns, and figs from thistles.  Why, even
out of that Caliban, old Woods, you used to extract a gleam of human
intelligence."

"He wasn't a Caliban at all.  I found him an excellent fellow at heart;
but what could you expect of a boy who, because he was big, awkward, and
stupid, was always getting flouted on all sides?  Sir Hugh Evans is not
the only person who disliked being made a `vlouting-stog.'"

"You must have some talisman for transmuting boys if you consider old
Woods an excellent fellow, Percival.  I found him a mass of laziness and
brute strength.  Do give me your secret."

"Try a little kindness and sympathy.  I have no other secret."

"I'm not conscious of failing in kindness," said Mr Robertson drily.
"My fault, I think, is being too kind."

"To clever, promising, bright boys--yes; to unthankful and evil boys
(excuse me for saying so)--no.  You don't try to descend to their dull
level, and so understand their difficulties.  You don't suffer fools
gladly, as we masters ought to do.  But, Paton," he said, turning the
conversation, which seemed distasteful to Mr Robertson, "will you try
how it succeeds to lay the yoke a little less heavily on Evson?"

"Well, Percival, I don't think that I've consciously bullied him.  I
can't make my system different to him and other boys."

"My dear Paton, forgive my saying that I don't think that a rigid system
is the fairest; _summa lex summa crux_.  Fish of very different sorts
and sizes come to our nets, and you can't shove a turbot through the
same mesh that barely admits a sprat."

"I'll think of what you say; but I must leave him in Dr Lane's hands
now," said Mr Paton.

"Who, I heartily hope, won't flog him," said Mr Percival.

"Why?  I don't see how he can do otherwise."

"Because it will simply drive him to despair; because, if I know
anything of his character, it will have upon him an effect incalculably
bad."

"I hope not," said Mr Paton.

The conversation dropped, and Mr Percival resumed his newspaper.

When Walter went to Dr Lane in the evening, the Doctor inquired kindly
and carefully into the nature of his offence.  This, unfortunately, was
clear enough, and Walter was far too ingenuous to attempt any
extenuation of it.  Even if he had not been intentionally idle, it was
plain, on his own admission, that he had been guilty of the greatest
possible insubordination and disrespect.  These offences were rare at
Saint Winifred's, and especially rare in a new boy.  Puzzled as he was
by conduct so unlike the boy's apparent character, and interested by his
natural and manly manner, yet Dr Lane had in this case no alternative
but the infliction of corporal punishment.

Humiliated again, and full of bitter anger, Walter returned to the great
schoolroom, where he was received with sympathy and kindness by the
others in his class.  It was the dark part of the evening before
tea-time, and the boys, sitting idly round the fire, were in an apt mood
for folly and mischief.  They began a vehement discussion about Paton's
demerits, and called him every hard name they could invent.  Walter took
little part in this, for he was smarting too severely under the sense of
oppression to find relief in mere abuse; but, from his flashing eyes and
the dark scowl that sat so ill on his face it was evident that a bad
spirit had obtained the thorough mastery over all his better and gentler
impulses.

"Can't we do something to serve the fellow out?" said Anthony, one of
the boys in Walter's dormitory.

"But _what_ can we do?" asked several.

"What, indeed?" asked Henderson, mockingly; and as it was his way to
quote whatever he had last been reading, he began to spout from the
peroration of a speech which he had seen in the paper--"Aristocracy,
throned on the citadel of power, and strong in--"

"What a fool you are, Henderson," observed Franklin, another of the
group; "I'll tell you what we can do: we'll burn that horrid black book
in which he enters the detentions and impositions."

"Poor book!" said Henderson; "what pangs of conscience it will suffer in
the flames!  Give it not the glory of such martyrdom.  Walter," he
continued, in a lower voice, "I hope that you'll have nothing to do with
this humbug?"

"I will though, Henderson; if I'm to have nothing but canings and
floggings, I may just as well be caned and flogged for _something_ as
for _nothing_."

"The desk's locked," said Anthony; "we shan't be able to get hold of the
imposition-book."

"I'll settle that," said Walter; "here, just hand me the poker, Dubbs."

"I shall do no such thing," said Daubeny quietly, and his reply was
greeted with a shout of derision.

"Why, you poor coward, Dubbs," said Franklin, "you _couldn't_ get
anything for handing the poker."

"I never supposed I could, Franklin," he answered; "and as for being a
coward, the real cowardice would be to do what's absurd and wrong for
fear of being laughed at or being kicked.  Well, you may hit me," he
said quietly, as Franklin twisted his arm tightly round, and hit him on
it, "but you can't make me do what I don't choose."

"We'll try," said Franklin, twisting his arm still more tightly, and
hitting harder.

"You'll try in vain," answered Daubeny, though the tears stood in his
eyes at the violent pain.

"Drop his arm, you Franklin," indignantly exclaimed Henderson, who,
though he was always teasing Daubeny, was very fond of him; "drop his
arm, or, by Jove! you'll find that two can play at that.  Dubbs is quite
right, and you're a set of asses if you think you'll do any good by
burning the punishment book.  I've got the poker, and you shan't have it
to knock the desk open.  I suppose Paton can afford sixpence to buy
another book; and enter a tolerable fresh score against you for this
besides."

"But he won't remember my six hundred lines, and four or five
detentions," said Walter.  "Here, give me the poker."

"Pooh! pooh!  Evson, of course he'll remember them.  Here, I'll help you
with the lines; I'll do a couple of hundred for you, and the rest you
can write with two pens at a time; it won't take you an hour.  I'll show
you the two-pen dodge; I'll admit you into the two-pen-etralia.  Like
Milton, you shall `touch the slender tops of various quills.'  No, no,"
he continued, in a playful tone in order not to make Walter in a greater
passion than he was, "you can't have the poker; anyone who wants that
must take it from me _vi et armis_."

"It doesn't matter; this'll do as well; and here goes," said Walter,
seizing a wooden stool.  "There's the desk open for you," he said, as he
brought the top of the stool with a strong blow against the lid, and
burst the lock with a great crash.

"My eyes! we _shall_ get into a row," said Franklin, opening his eyes to
illustrate his exclamation.

"Well, what's done's done; let's all take our share," said Anthony,
diving his hand into the desk.  "Here's the imposition-book for you, and
here goes leaf number one into the fire; you can tear out the next if
you like, Franklin."

"Very well," said Franklin; "in for a penny in for a pound; there _goes_
the second leaf."

"And here the third; over ankles over knees," said Barton, another of
those present.

"Proverbial Fool-osophy," observed Henderson, contemptuously, as Burton
handed him the book.  "Shall I be a silly sheep like the rest of you,
and leap over the bridge because your leader has?  I suppose I must,
though it's very absurd."  He wavered and hesitated; sensible enough to
disapprove of so useless a proceeding, he yet did not like to be thought
afraid.  He minded what fellows would _think_.

"Do what's right," said Daubeny, "and shame the devil.  Here, give me
the book.  Now, you fellows, you've torn out these leaves, and done
quite mischief enough.  Let me put the book back, and don't be like
children who hit the fender against which they've knocked their heads."

"Or dogs that bite the stick they've been thrashed with," said
Henderson.  "You're right, Dubbs, and I respect you; ay, you fellows may
sneer if you like, but I advised you not to do it, and I won't make
myself an idiot because you do."

"Never mind," drawled Howard Tracy.  "I hate Paton, and I'll do anything
to spite him," whereupon he snatched the book from Daubeny, and threw it
entire into the flames.  Poor Tracy had been even in more serious
scrapes with Mr Paton than Walter had; his vain manner was peculiarly
abhorrent to the master, who took every opportunity of snubbing him; but
nothing would pierce through the thick cloak of Tracy's conceit, and
fully satisfied with himself, his good looks, and his aristocratic
connections, he sat down in contented ignorance, and despised learning
too much to be in the least put out by being invariably the last in his
form.

"What, is there nothing left for me to burn?" said Walter, who sat
glowering on the high iron fender, and swinging his legs impatiently.
"Let's see what else there is in the desk.  Here are a pack of old
exercises, apparently; they'll make a jolly blaze.  Stop, though, _are_
they old exercises?  Well, never mind; if not, so much the better.  In
they shall go."

"Stop! what _are_ you doing, Walter?" said Henderson, catching him by
the arm; "you know these can't be old exercises.  Paton always puts
_them_ in his waste-paper basket, not in his desk.  Oh, Walter, what
_have_ you done?"

"The outside sheets were exercises anyhow," said Walter gloomily.
"Here, it's no good trying to save them now, whatever they were" (for
Henderson was attempting to rake them out between the bars); "they're
done for now," and he pressed down the thick mass of foolscap into the
reddest centre of the fire, and held it there until nothing remained of
it but a heap of flaky crimson ashes.

A dead silence followed, for the boys felt that now, at any rate, they
were "in for it."

The sound of the tea-bell prevented further mischief; and as Henderson
thrust his arm through Walter's, he said, "Oh, Evson, I wish you hadn't
done that!  I wish I'd got you to come away before.  What a passionate
fellow you are!"

"Well, it's done now," said Walter, already beginning to soften, and to
repent of his fatuity.

"What can we do?" said Henderson anxiously.

"Take the consequences, that's all," answered Walter.

"Hadn't you better go and tell Paton about it at once instead of letting
him find it out?"

"No," said Walter; "he's done nothing but bully me, and I don't care."

"Then let me go," said his friend earnestly.  "I know Paton well; I'm
sure he'd be ready to forgive you, if I explained it all to him."

"You're very good, Flip; but don't go:--it's too late."

"Well, Walter, you mustn't think that I had no share in this because of
being afraid.  I was one of the group, and I'll share the punishment
with you, whatever it is.  I hope for your sake it won't be found out."

But if Henderson had seen a little deeper he would have hoped that it
would be found out, for there is nothing that works quicker ruin to any
character than undiscovered sin.  It was happy for Walter that his wrong
impulses did _not_ remain undiscovered; happy for him that they came so
rapidly to be known and to be punished.

It was noised through the school in five minutes that Evson, one of the
new fellows, had smashed open Paton's desk and burned the contents.
"What an awful row he'll get into!" was the general comment.  Walter
heard Kenrick inquiring eagerly about it as they sat at tea; but Kenrick
didn't ask _him_ about it, though they sat so near each other.  After
the foolish, proud manner of sensitive boys, Walter and Kenrick, though
each liked the other none the less, were not on speaking terms.  Walter,
less morbidly proud than Kenrick, would not have suffered this silly
alienation to continue had not his attention been occupied by other
troubles.  Neither of them, therefore, liked to be the first to break
the ice, and now in his most serious difficulty Walter had lost the
advice and sympathy of his most intimate friend.

The fellows seemed to think that he must inevitably be expelled for this
_fracas_.  The poor boy's thoughts were very, very bitter as he laid his
head that night on his restless pillow, remembered what an ungovernable
fool he had been, and dreamt of his happy and dear-loved home.  How
strangely he seemed to have left his old, innocent life behind him, and
how little he would have believed it possible, two months ago, that he
could by any conduct of his own have so soon incurred, or nearly
incurred, the penalty of expulsion from Saint Winifred's School.

He had certainly yielded very quickly to passion, and he felt that in
consequence he had made his position more serious than that of other
boys who were in every sense of the word twice as bad as himself.  But
what he laid to the score of his ill-luck was in truth a very happy
providence by which punishment was sent speedily and heavily upon him,
and so his evil tendencies, mercifully nipped in the bud, crushed with a
tender yet with an iron hand before they had expanded more blossoms and
been fed by deeper roots.  He might have been punished less speedily had
his faults been more radical, or his wrong-doings of a deeper dye.



CHAPTER EIGHT.

THE BURNT MANUSCRIPT.

  All
  All my poor scrapings, from a dozen years
  Of dust and desk-work.

  Sea Dreams.

It may be supposed that during chapel the next morning, and when he went
into early school, Walter was in an agony of almost unendurable
suspense; and this suspense was doomed to be prolonged for some time,
until at last he could hardly sit still.  Mr Paton did not at once
notice that his desk was broken.  He laid down his books, and went on as
usual with the morning lesson.

At length Tracy was put on.  He stood up in his usual self-satisfied
way, looking admiringly at his boots, and running his delicate white
hand through his scented hair.  Mr Paton watched him with a somewhat
contemptuous expression, as though he were thinking what a pity it was
that any boy should be such a little puppy.  Henderson, with his usual
quick discrimination, had nicknamed Tracy the "Lisping Hawthornbud."

"Your fifth failure this week, Tracy; you must do the usual punishment,"
said Mr Paton, taking up his key to unlock the desk.

"Now for it," thought all the form, looking on with great anxiety.

The key caught hopelessly in the broken lock.  Mr Paton's attention was
aroused; he pushed the lid off the desk, and saw at once that it had
been broken open.

"Who has broken open my desk?"

No answer.

He looked very grave, but said nothing, looking for his imposition-book.

"Where is my imposition-book?"

No answer.

"And where is my--?"

Mr Paton stopped, and looked with the greatest eagerness over every
corner of the desk.

"Where is the manuscript I left here with my imposition-book?" he said
in a tone of the most painful anxiety.

"I do hope and trust," he said, turning pale, "that none of you have
been wicked enough to injure it," and here his voice faltered.  "When I
tell you that it was of the utmost value, I am sure that if any of you
have concealed or taken it, you will give it back at once."

There was deep silence.

"Once again," he asked, "where is my imposition-book?"

"Burnt, sir; burnt, sir," said one or two voices, hardly above a
whisper.

"And my manuscript?" he asked, in a louder voice, and in still greater
agitation.  "Surely, surely, you cannot have been so thoughtless, so
incredibly unjust as to--"

Walter stood up in his place, with his head bent, and his face covered
with an ashy whiteness.  "I burnt it, sir," he said, in an almost
inaudible voice, and trembling with fear.

"Come here," said Mr Paton impetuously; "I can't hear what you say.
Now, then," he continued, as Walter crept up beside his desk.

"I burnt it, sir," he said, in a whisper.

"You--burnt--it!" said Mr Paton, starting up in uncontrollable emotion,
which changed into a burst of anger as he gave Walter a box on the ear
which sounded all over the room, and made the boy stagger back to his
place.  But the flash of rage was gone in an instant; and the next
moment Mr Paton, afraid of trusting himself any longer, left his desk
and hurried out, anxious to recover in solitude the calmness of mind and
action which had been so terribly disturbed.

Mr Percival, who taught his form in another part of the room, seeing
Mr Paton box Walter so violently on the ear, and knowing that this was
the very reverse of his usual method, since he had never before touched
a boy in anger, walked up to see what was the matter, just as Mr Paton,
with great hurried strides, had reached the door.

"What is the matter with Mr Paton?" he asked.

There was a general murmur through the form, out of which Mr Percival
caught something about Mr Paton's papers having been burnt.

Anxious to fend him, to ask what had happened, Mr Percival, leaving the
room, caught sight of him pacing with hasty and uneven steps along a
private garden walk which belonged to the masters.

"I hope nothing unpleasant has occurred," he said, overtaking him.

"Oh, nothing, nothing," said Mr Paton, with quivering lip, as he turned
aside.  And then, suppressing his emotion by a powerful effort of
self-control, "It is only," he said, "that the hard results of fifteen
years' continuous labour are now condensed into a heap of smut and ashes
in the schoolroom fire."

"You don't mean to say that your Hebrew manuscripts are burnt?" asked
Mr Percival in amazement.

"You know how I have been toiling at them for years, Percival; you know
that I began them before I left college, that I regarded them as the
chief work of my life, and that I devoted to them every moment of my
leisure.  You know, too, the pride and pleasure which I took in their
progress, and the relief with which I turned to them from the vexations
and anxieties of one's life here.  To work at them has been for years my
only recreation and delight.  Well, they were finished at last; I was
only correcting them for the press; they would have gone to the printer
in a month, and I should have lived to complete a toilsome and
honourable task.  Well, the dream is over, and a handful of ashes
represents the struggle of my best years."

Mr Percival knew well that his coadjutor had been working for years at
a commentary on the Hebrew text of the Four Greater Prophets.  It had
been the cherished and chosen task of his life; he had brought to it
great stores of learning, accumulated in the vigour of his powers, and
the enthusiasm of a youthful ambition, and he had employed upon it every
spare hour left him from his professional duties.  He looked to it as
the means of doing essential service to the church of which he was an
ordained member, and, secondarily, as the road to reputation and
well-merited advancement.  And in five minutes the hand of one angry boy
had robbed him of the fruit of all his hopes.

"If they wanted to display the hatred which I well know that they feel,"
said Mr Paton bitterly, "they might have chosen any way, literally _any
way_, but that.  They might have left me, at least, that which was
almost my only pleasure and object in life, and which had no connection
with them or their pursuits."  And his face grew haggard as he stopped
in his walk, and tried to realise the extent of what he had lost.  "I
would rather have seen everything I possess in the whole world destroyed
than that," he said slowly, and with strong emotion.

"And was it really Evson who did this?" asked Mr Percival, filled with
the sincerest pity for his colleague's wounded feelings.

"It matters little who did it, Percival; but, yes, it was your friend
Evson."

"The little, graceless, abominable wretch!" exclaimed Mr Percival with
anger, "he must be expelled.  But can't you recommence the task?"

"Recommence?" said Mr Paton, in a hard voice; "and who will give me
back the hope and vigour of the last fifteen years? how shall I have the
heart again to toil through the same long trains of research and
thought? where are the hundreds of references which I had sought out and
verified with hours of heavy midnight labour? how am I to have access
again to the scores of books which I consulted before I began to work?
The very thought of it sickens me.  Youth and hope are over.  No,
Percival, there is no more to be said.  I am robbed of a life's work.
Leave me, please, alone for a little, until I have learnt to say less
bitterly, `God's will be done.'"

  "`He needeth not
  Either man's work or his own gifts; who best
  Bear his mild yoke they please him best,'"

said Mr Percival, in a tone of kind and deep sympathy, as he left him
to return to the schoolroom.

But once in sight of Mr Paton's open and rifled desk, Mr Percival's
pent-up indignation burst forth into clear flame.  Stopping in front of
Mr Paton's form, he exclaimed, in a voice that rang with scorn and
sorrow--

"You boys do not know the immense mischief which your thoughtless and
worthless spite and folly have caused.  I say `boys,' but I believe, and
rejoice to believe, that one only of you is guilty, and I rejoice too,
that _that_ one is a new boy, who must have brought here feelings and
passions more worthy of an ignorant and ill-trained plough-boy than of a
Saint Winifred's scholar.  The hand that would burn a valuable
manuscript would fire a rick of hay."

"O sir," said Henderson, starting up and interrupting him, "we were all
very nearly as bad.  It was the rest of us that burnt the
imposition-book; Evson had nothing to do with that."  Henderson had
forgotten for the moment that he at least had had no share in burning
the imposition-book, for his warm quick heart could not bear that these
blows should fall unbroken on his friend's head.

But his generous effort failed; for Mr Percival, barely noticing the
interruption, continued, "The imposition-book?  I know nothing about
that.  If you burnt it you were very foolish and reckless; you deserve
no doubt to be punished for it, but that was _comparatively_ nothing.
But do you know, bad boy," he said, turning again to Walter, "do you
know what _you_ have done?  Do you know that your dastardly spitefulness
has led you to destroy writings which had cost your master years and
years of toil that cannot be renewed?  He treated you with unswerving
impartiality; he never punished you but when you deserved punishment,
and when he believed it to be for your good, and yet you turn upon him
in this adder-like way; you break open his desk like a thief, and, in
one moment of despicable ill-temper, you rob him and the world of that
which had been the pursuit and object of his life.  You, Evson, may well
hide your face"--for Walter had bent over the desk, and in agonies of
shame and remorse had covered his face with both hands--"you may well be
ashamed to look either at me or at any honest and manly and right-minded
boy among your companions.  You have done a wrong for which it will be
years hence a part of your retribution to remember that nothing you can
ever do can repair it, or do away with its effects.  I am more than
disappointed with you.  You have done mischief which the utmost working
of all your powers cannot for years counterbalance, if, instead of being
as base and idle as you now appear to be, you were to devote your whole
heart to work.  I don't know what will be done to you; I, for my part,
hope that you will not be suffered to remain with us; but, if you are, I
am sure that you will receive, as you richly deserve, the reprobation
and contempt of every boy among your schoolfellows who is capable of one
spark of honour or right feeling."

Every word that Mr Percival had said came to poor Walter with the most
poignant force; all the master's reproaches pierced his heart and let
blood.  He sat there not stirring, stunned and crushed, as though he had
been beaten by the blows of a hammer.  He quailed and shuddered to think
of the great and cruel injustice, the base and grievous injury into
which his blind passion had betrayed him, and thought that he could
never hold up his head again.

Mr Percival's indignant expostulation passed over the other culprits
who heard it like a thunderstorm.  There was a force and impetuosity in
this gentleman's manner, when his anger was kindled, which had long
gained for him among the boys, with whom he was the most popular
of all the masters, the half-complimentary soubriquet of
"Thunder-and-lightning."  But none of them had ever before heard him
speak with such concentrated energy and passion, and all except generous
little Henderson were awed by it into silence.  But Henderson at that
moment was wholly absorbed in Walter's sorrows.

"Tell him," said he in Walter's ear, "tell him it was all a mistake,
that you thought the papers were old exercises.  Dear Walter, tell him
before he goes."

But Walter still rested with his white cheeks on his hands upon the
desk, and neither moved nor spoke.  And Mr Percival, turning
indignantly upon his heel, with one last glance of unmitigated contempt,
had walked off to his own form.

"Walter, don't take it to heart so," said Henderson, putting his arm
round his neck; "you couldn't help it; you made a sad mistake, that's
all.  Go and tell Paton so, and I'm sure he'll forgive you."

A slight quiver was all that showed that Walter heard.  Henderson would
have liked to see his anguish relieved by a burst of tears; but the
tears did not come, and Walter did not move.

At last a hand touched him, and he heard the voice of the head boy say
to him, "Get up, Evson; I'm to take you to Dr Lane with a note from Mr
Percival."

He rose and followed mechanically, waiting in the headmaster's porch
while the monitor went in.

"Dr Lane won't see you now," said Somers, coming out again.  "Croft,"
(addressing the school Famulus), "Dr Lane says you're to lock up Mr
Evson by himself in the private room."

Walter followed the Famulus to the private room, a little room at the
top of the house, where he knew that boys were locked previous to
expulsion, that they might have no opportunity for doing any mischief
before they went.

The Famulus left him here, and returned a few minutes after with some
dry bread and milk, which he placed on the deal table, which, with a
wooden chair, constituted the sole furniture of the room; he then locked
the door, and left Walter finally to his own reflections.

Then it was that flood after flood of passionate tears seemed to remove
the iron cramp which had pained his heart.  He flung himself on the
floor, and as he thought of the irreparable cruelty which he had
inflicted on a man who had been severe indeed, but never unkind to him,
and of the apparent malignity to which all who heard it would attribute
what he had done, he sobbed and sobbed as though his heart would break.

At one o'clock the Famulus returned with some dinner.  He found Walter
sitting at a corner of the room, his head resting against the angle of
the wall, and his eyes red and inflamed with long crying.  The morning's
meal still lay untasted on the table.

He looked round with a commiserating glance.  "Come, come, Master
Evson," he said, "you've no call to give way so, sir.  If you've done
wrong, the wrong's done now, and frettin' won't help it.  There's them
above as'll forgive you, and make you do better next time, lad, if you
only knew it.  Here, you must eat some of this dinner, Master Evson, and
leave off cryin' so; cryin's no comfort, sir."

He stood by and waited on Walter with the greatest kindness and respect,
till he had seen him swallow some food, not without difficulty, and then
with encouraging and cheerful words left him, and once more locked the
door.

The weary afternoon wore on, and Walter sat mournfully alone with
nothing but miserable thoughts--miserable to whatever subject he turned
them, and more miserable the longer he dwelt on them.  As the shades of
evening drew in he felt his head swimming, and the long solitude made
him feel afraid as he wondered whether they would leave him there all
night.  And then he heard a light step approach the door, and a gentle
tap.  He made no answer, for he thought he knew the step, and he could
not summon up voice to speak for a fit of sobbing which it brought on.
Then he heard the boy stoop down, and push a note under the door.

He took it up when he heard the footsteps die away, and by the fast
failing light was just able to make it out.  It ran thus--

  "Dear Walter,--You can't think how sorry, how very, very sorry I am
  for you.  I wish I could be with you and take part of your punishment.
  Forgive me for being cold and proud to you.  I have been longing to
  speak to you all the time, but felt too shy.  It was all my fault.  I
  will never break with you again.  Good-bye, dear Walter, from your
  ever and truly affectionate, Harry Kenrick."

"He will never break with me again," thought Walter.  "If I'm to go
to-morrow I'm afraid he'll never have the chance."  And then his saddest
thoughts reverted to the home which he had left so recently for the
first time, and to which he was to return with nothing but dishonour and
disgrace.

At six o'clock the kind-hearted Famulus brought him a lamp, some tea,
and one or two books, which he had no heart to read.  No one was allowed
to visit the private room under heavy penalties, so that Walter had no
other visitor until eight, when Somers, the monitor who had taken him to
Dr Lane, looked in and icily observed, "You're to sleep in the
sickroom, Evson; come with me."

"Am I expelled, Somers?" he faltered out.

"I don't know," said Somers in a freezing tone; "you deserve to be."

True! oh lofty and pitiless Somers.  But is that all which you could
find to say to the poor boy in his distress?  And if we _all_ had our
deserts...?

"At any rate," Somers added, "I for one won't have you as a fag any
longer, and I shouldn't think that anyone else would either."

With which cutting remark he left Walter to his reflections.



CHAPTER NINE.

PENITENCE.

  "If hearty sorrow
  Be a sufficient ransom for offence,
  I tender it here; I do as truly suffer
  As e'er I did commit."

  Two Gentlemen of Verona.--Act five, scene 4.

Next morning Walter was reconducted to the private room, and there, with
a kind of dull pain in head and heart, awaited the sentence which was to
decide his fate.  His fancy had left Saint Winifred's altogether; it was
solely occupied with Semlyn, and the dear society at home.  Walter was
rehearsing again and again in his mind the scene of his return; what he
should say to his father; how he should dry his mother's tears; and how
he should bear himself, on his return, towards his little brothers and
sisters.  Would he, expelled from Saint Winifred's, ever be able to look
anyone in the face again at home?

While he was brooding over these fancies, someone, breathless with
haste, ran up to his room, and again a note was thrust underneath the
door.  He seized it quickly, and read--

  "Dear Walter,--I am so glad to be the first to tell you that you are
  not to be expelled.  Paton has begged you off.  No time for more.  I
  have slipped away before morning school to leave you this news, and
  can't stay lest I should be caught.  Good-bye, from your ever
  affectionate friend,

  "H.K."

The boy's heart gave one bound of joy as he read this.  If he were not
expelled he was ready to bear meekly any other punishment appointed to
his offence.  But his banishment from the school would cause deep
affliction to others besides himself, and this was why he had dreaded it
with such a feeling of despair.

Alone as he was in the little room, he fell on his knees, and heartily
and humbly thanked God for this answer to his earnest, passionate,
reiterated prayer; and then he read Kenrick's note again.

"Paton has begged you off."  He repeated this sentence over and over
again, aloud and to himself, and seemed as if he could never realise it.
Paton--Paton, the very man whom he had so deeply and irreparably
injured--had begged him off, and shielded him from a punishment which no
one could have considered too severe for his fault.  Young and
inexperienced as Walter Evson was, he could not, of course, fully
understand and appreciate the _amount_ of the loss, the nature and
degree of the injury which he had inflicted; but yet, he _could_
understand that he had done something which caused greater pain to his
master than even the breaking of a limb, or falling ill of a severe
sickness.  And he never prayed for himself without praying also that Mr
Paton's misfortune might in some way be alleviated; and even, impossible
as the prayer might seem, that he, Walter, might himself have some share
in rendering it more endurable.

It may seem strange that Walter should be apparently excessive in his
own self-condemnation.  A generous mind usually is; but Walter, it may
be urged, never intended to do the harm he had done.  If he mistook the
packet for a number of exercises the fault was comparatively venial,
comparatively--yes; for though it will be admitted that to break open a
private desk and throw its contents into the fire is bad enough in a
schoolboy under any circumstances, still it would be a far less
aggravated sin than the wilful infliction of a heavy damage out of a
spirit of revenge.  But here lay the gravamen of Walter's fault; he
knew--though he had not said so--in his inmost heart he _knew_ that the
packet did not, and could not, consist merely of old exercises, like the
outer sheets, which were put to keep it clean.  When he threw it into
the fire and thrust it down until it blazed away, he felt sure--and at
that wicked moment of indulged passion he rejoiced to feel sure--that
what he was consuming was of real value.  Henderson's voice awoke in a
moment his dormant conscience; but then, however keen were the stings of
remorse, what had been done could never be undone.  And "Paton had
begged him off"!  It was all the more wonderful to him, and he was all
the more deeply grateful for it, because he knew that, in Mr Paton's
views, the law of punishment for every offence was as a law of iron and
adamant--a law as undeviating and beneficial as the law of gravitation
itself.

A slow and hesitating footstep--the sound of the key turning in the
door--a nervous hand resting on the handle--and Mr Paton stood before
him.

In an instant Walter was on his knees beside him, his head bent over his
clasped hands.  "Oh, sir," he exclaimed, "please forgive me!  I have
been longing to see you, sir, to implore you to forgive me; for when you
have forgiven me I shan't mind anything else.  Oh, sir, forgive me, if
you can."

"Do you know, Evson, the extent of what you have done?" said Mr Paton,
in a constrained voice.

"Oh, sir, indeed I do," he exclaimed, bursting into tears.  "Mr
Percival said I had destroyed years and years of hard work, and that I
can never, never, never make up for it, or repair it again.  Oh, sir,
indeed I didn't know how much mischief I was doing; I was in a wicked
passion then, but I would give my right-hand not to have done it now.
Oh, sir, can you ever forgive me?" he asked, in a tone of pitiable
despair.

"Have you asked God's forgiveness for your passionate and revengeful
spirit, Evson?" said the same constrained voice.

"Oh, sir, I have, and I know God has forgiven me.  Indeed I never knew,
I never thought before, that I could grow so wicked in a day.  Oh, sir,
what shall I do to gain your forgiveness; I would do anything, sir," he
said, in a voice thick with sobs; "and if you forgave me, I could be
almost happy."

All this while Walter had not dared to look up in Mr Paton's face.
Abashed as he was, he could not bear to meet the only look which he
expected to find there, the old cold unpitying look of condemnation and
reproach.  Even at that moment he could not help thinking that if Mr
Paton had understood him better, he would not have seemed to him so
utterly bad as then he must seem, with so recent an act of sin and folly
to bear witness against him.

He dared not look up through his eyes swimming with tears; but he had
not expected the kind and gentle touch of the trembling hand that rested
on his head as though it blessed him, and that smoothed again and again
his dark hair, and wiped the big drops away from his cheeks.  He had not
expected the arm that raised him up from his kneeling position, and the
fingers that pushed back his hair from his forehead, and gently bent
back his head; or the pitying eyes, themselves dim, as though they were
about to well over with compassion--that looked so sorrowfully, yet so
kindly, into his own.  He could not bear this.  If Mr Paton had struck
him, as he did in the first moment of overwhelming anger; if he had
spurned him away, and ordered him any amount of punishment, it would
have been far easier to bear than this Christian gentleness; this ready
burying in pity and oblivion of the heaviest and most undeserved
calamity which the master had ever undergone at the hands of man.
Walter could not bear it; he flung himself on his knees again in a
passion of weeping, and clasped Mr Paton's knees, uttering in broken
sentences, "I can never make up for it, never repair it as long as I
live."

For a moment more the kind hand again rested on the boy's head, and
gently smoothed his dark hair; and then Mr Paton found voice to speak,
and lifting him up, and seating him upon his knee, said to him--

"I forgive you, Walter, forgive you freely and gladly.  It was hard, I
own, at first to do so, for I will not disguise from you that this loss
is a very bitter thing to bear.  I have been sleepless, and have never
once been able to banish the distress of mind which it has caused since
it occurred.  And yet it is a loss which I shall _not_ feel fully all at
once, but most and for many a long day when I sit down again, if God
gives me strength to do so, to recover the lost stores and rearrange the
interrupted thoughts.  But I, too, have learnt a lesson, Walter; and
when you have reached my age, my boy, you too, I trust, will have learnt
to control all evil passions with a strong will, and to bear meekly and
patiently _whatever_ God sends.  And you too, Walter, learn a lesson.
You have said that you would give anything, do anything, to undo this
wrong, or to repair it; but you can do nothing, my child, give nothing,
for it cannot be undone.  Wrong rarely can be mended.  Let this very
helplessness teach you a truth that may remain with you through life.
Let it check you in wilful impetuous moments; for what has once been
done remains irrevocable.  You may rue for years and years the work of
days or of moments, and you may _never_ be able to avoid the
consequences, even when the deed itself has been forgotten by the
generous and forgiven by the just."  And all this so kindly, so gently,
so quietly spoken; every word of it sank into Walter's heart never to be
forgotten, as his tears flowed still but with more quiet sadness now.

"Yes, Walter, this occurrence," continued Mr Paton in a calm, low
voice, "may do us both good, miserable as it is.  I will say no more
about it now, only that I have quite forgiven it.  Man is far too mean a
creature to be justified in withholding forgiveness for any personal
wrong.  It is far more hard to forgive one's-self when one has done
wrong.  I have determined to bury the whole matter in oblivion, and to
inflict no punishment either on you or on any of the other boys who were
concerned in this folly and sin.  I will not forgive by halves.  But,
Walter, I will not wrong you by doubting that from this time forward you
will advance with a marked improvement.  You will have something to
bear, no doubt, but do not let it weigh on you too heavily; and as for
me, I will try henceforth to be your friend."

What could Walter do but seize his hand and clasp it earnestly, and sob
out the broken incoherent thanks which were more eloquent than connected
words.

"And now, Walter, you are free," said Mr Paton.  "From _us_ you will
hear no more of this offence.  It is nearly dinner-time.  Come; I will
walk with you to hall."

He laid his hand on the boy's shoulder, and they walked downstairs and
across the court.  Walter was deeply grateful that he did so, for he had
heard rumours of the scorn and indignation with which the news of his
conduct had been received by the elder and more influential portions of
the school.  He had dreaded unspeakably the first occasion when it would
be necessary to meet them again, but he felt that Mr Paton's
countenance and kindness had paved the way for him, and smoothed his
most formidable trial.  It had been beyond his warmest hopes that he
should be able to face them so.  He had never dared to expect this open
proof, that the person who had suffered chiefly from this act would also
be the first to show that he had not cast him off as helpless or
worthless, but was ready to receive him into favour once again.

The corridor was full of boys waiting for the dinner bell, and they
divided respectfully to leave a passage for Mr Paton, and touched their
hats as he passed them with his hand still on Walter's shoulder, while
Walter walked with downcast eyes beside him, not once daring to look up.
And as the boy passed them, humbled and penitent, with Mr Paton's hand
resting upon him, there was not one of those who saw it that did not
learn from that sight a lesson of calm forgiveness as noble and as
forcible as any lesson which they could learn at Saint Winifred's
School.

Walter sat at dinner pale and crying, but unpitied.  "Alas for the
rarity of Christian charity under the sun!"--the worst construction had
assiduously been put upon what he had done, and nearly all the boys
hastily condemned it, not only as an ungentlemanly, but also as an
inexcusable and unpardonable act.  One after another, as they passed him
after dinner, they cut him dead.  Several of the masters, including Mr
Percival, whom Walter had hitherto loved and respected more than any of
them, because he had been treated by him with marked kindness, did the
same.  Walter met Mr Percival in the playground and touched his cap;
Mr Percival glanced at him contemptuously for a moment, and then turned
his head aside without noticing the salute.  It may seem strange, but we
must remember that to all who hear of any wrong act by report only, it
presents itself as a mere naked fact--a bare result without preface or
palliation.  The subtle grades of temptation which led to it--the
violent outburst of passion long pent-up which thus found its
consummation--are unknown or forgotten, and the deed itself, isolated
from all that rendered it possible, receives unmitigated condemnation.
All that anyone took the trouble to know or to believe about Walter's
scrape was, that he had broken open a master's private desk, and in
revenge had purposely burnt a most valuable manuscript; and for this,
sentence was passed upon him broadly and in the gross.

Poor Walter! those were dark days for him; but Henderson and Kenrick
stuck fast by him, and little Arthur Eden still looked up to him with
unbounded gratitude and affection, and he felt that the case was not
hopeless.  Kenrick, indeed, seemed to waver once or twice.  He sought
Walter and shook hands with him at once, but still he was not with him,
Walter fancied, so much as he had been or might have been, till, after a
short struggle, his natural impulse of generosity won the day.  As for
Henderson, Walter thought he could have died for him, so much he loved
him for his kindness in this hour of need; and Eden never left his side
when he could creep there to console him by merry playfulness, or to be
his companion when he would otherwise have been alone.

The boys had been truly sorry to hear of Mr Paton's loss; it roused all
their most generous feelings.  That evening as they came out of chapel
they all gathered round the iron gates.  The intention had been to groan
at poor Walter.  He knew of it perfectly well, for Henderson had
prepared him for it, and expressed his determination to walk by his
side.  It was for him a moment of keen anguish, and that anguish
betrayed itself in his scared and agitated look.  But he was spared this
last drop in the cup of punishment.  The mere sight of him showed the
boys that he had suffered bitterly enough already.  When they looked at
him they had not the heart to hurt and shame him any more.  Mr Paton's
open forgiveness of that which had fallen most severely on himself
changed the current of their feelings.  Instead of groaning Walter they
let him pass by, and waited till Mr Paton came out of the chapel door,
and as he walked across the court the boys all followed him with hearty
cheers.

Mr Paton did not like the demonstration, although he appreciated the
kindly and honourable motives which had given rise to it.  He was not a
man who courted popularity, and this external sign of it was, as he well
knew, the irregular expression of an evanescent feeling.  So he took no
further notice of the boys' cheers than by slightly raising his cap, and
by one stately inclination of the head, and then he walked on with his
usual quiet dignity of manner to his own rooms.  But after this he every
now and then took an opportunity to walk with Walter; and almost every
Sunday evening he might have been seen with him pacing, after morning
chapel, up and down the broad walk of the masters' garden, while Walter
walked unevenly beside him, in vain endeavours to keep step with his
long slow stride.

A letter from Dr Lane brought Walter's father to Saint Winifred's the
next day.  Why dwell on their sad and painful meeting?  But the pain of
it soon wore off as they interchanged that sweet and frank communion of
thoughts and sympathies that still existed as it had ever done between
them.  They had a long, long walk upon the shore, and at every step
Walter seemed to in-breathe fresh strength, and hope, and consolation,
and Mr Evson seemed to acquire new love for, and confidence in, his
unhappy little son, so that when in the evening he kissed him and said
"good-bye," at the top of the same hill where they had parted before,
Mr Evson felt more happily and gratefully secure of his radical
integrity, now that the boy had acquired the strength which comes
through trial, through failure, and through suffering, than he had done
before when he had left him only with the strength of early principle
and untested innocence of heart.

But long years after, when Walter was a man, and when he had been
separated for years from all intelligence of Mr Paton, there emanated
from a quiet country vicarage a now celebrated edition of the "Major
Prophets," an edition which made the author a high reputation, and
secured for him in the following year the Deanery of --.  And in the
preface to that edition the reader may still find the following passage,
which, as Walter saw even then, those long years after, he could not
read without a thrill of happy, yet penitent emotion.  It ran thus--

  "This edition of the `Major Prophets' has been the chosen work of the
  author's leisure, and he is almost afraid to say how many of the best
  years of his life have been spent upon it.  A strange fortune has
  happened to it.  Years ago it was finished, and it was written out,
  and ready for the press.  At that time it was burnt--no matter under
  what circumstances--by a boy's hand.  At first, the author never hoped
  to have the courage or power to resume and finish the task again.  But
  it pleased God, Who sent him this trial, to provide him also with
  leisure, and opportunity, and resolution, so that the old misfortune
  is now at last repaired.  It is for the sake of one person, and one
  person only, that these private matters are intruded on the reader's
  notice; but that person, if his eye should ever fall on these lines,
  will know also why the word `repaired' has been printed in larger
  letters.  And I would also tell him with all kindness, that it has
  pleased God to bring out of the rash act of his boyhood nothing but
  good.  The following commentary is, I humbly trust, far more worthy of
  its high subject, now that it has received the maturer consideration
  of my advancing years, than it would have been had it seen the light
  at Saint Winifred's long ago.  I write this for the sake of the boy
  who then wept for what seemed an _irreparable_ fault; and I add
  thankfully, that never for a moment have I retracted my then
  forgiveness; that I think of his after efforts with kindliness and
  affection; and that he has, and always will have, my best prayers for
  his interest and welfare.

  "H. Paton."



CHAPTER TEN.

UPHILLWARDS.

  "But that Conscience makes me firm.
  The boon companion, who her strong breastplate
  Buckles on him that feels no guilt within,
  And bids him on and fear not."

  Dante, c. xxviii.

"Qui s'excuse s'accuse."  "If a character can't defend itself, it's not
worth defending."  "No one was ever written down, except by himself."
These, and proverbs like these, express the common and almost
instinctive feeling, that self-defence under calumny is generally
unsuccessful, and almost always involves a loss of dignity.  Partly from
this cause, and partly from penitence for his real errors, and partly
from scorn at the malice that misrepresented him, and the Pharisaism of
far worse offenders that held aloof from his misfortune, Walter said
nothing to exculpate his conduct, or to shield himself from the silent
indignation, half real and half affected, which weighed heavily against
him.

The usual consequences followed; the story of his misdoing was repeated
and believed in the least mitigated form, and this version gained
credence and currency because it was uncontradicted.  The school society
bound his sin upon him; they retained it, and it was retained.  It
burdened his conscience with a galling weight, because by his fellows it
remained long unforgiven.  At the best, those were days of fiery trial
to that overcharged young heart.  He had not only lost all immediate
influence, but as he looked forward through the vista of his
school-life, he feared that he should never entirely regain it.  Even if
he should in time become a monitor, he felt as if half his authority
must be lost while this stigma was branded so deeply on his name.

Yet it was a beautiful sight to see how bravely and manfully this young
boy set himself to re-establish the reputation he had destroyed, and
since he could not "build upon the _foundations_ of yesterday," to build
upon its _ruins_; to see with what touching humility he accepted
undeserved scorn, and with what touching gratitude he hailed the
scantiest kindness; to see how he bore up unflinchingly under every
difficulty, accepted his hard position among unsympathising
schoolfellows, and made the most of it, without anger and without
complaint.  He could see in after years that those days were to him a
time of unmitigated blessing.  They taught him lessons of manliness, of
endurance, of humility.  The necessity of repairing an error and
recovering a failure became to him a more powerful stimulus than the
hope of avoiding it altogether.  The hour of punishment, which was
bitter as absinthe to his taste, became sweet as honey in his memory.
Above all, these days taught him, in a manner never to be forgotten, the
invaluable lesson that the sense of having done an ill deed is the very
heaviest calamity that an ill deed ensures, and that in life there is no
single secret of happiness comparable to the certain blessing brought
with it by a conscience void of all offence.

Perhaps the strain would have been too great for his youthful spirits,
and might have left on his character an impress of permanent melancholy,
derived from thus perpetually being reminded that he had gone wrong, but
for a school sermon which Mr Paton preached about this time, and which
Walter felt was meant in part for him.  It was on the danger and
unwisdom of brooding continually on what is over; and it was preached
upon the text, "I will restore to you the years which the locust hath
eaten, the canker-worm, the caterpillar, and the palmerworm, my great
army."

"The past is past," said the preacher; "its sins and sorrows are
irrevocably over; why dwell upon it now?  Do not waste the present, with
all its opportunities, in a hopeless and helpless retrospect.  The worst
of us need not despair, much less those who may have been betrayed into
sudden error by some moment of unguarded passion.  There lies the future
before you; onwards then, and forwards! it is yet an innocent, it may be
a happy, future.  Take it with prayerful thankfulness, and fling the
withered part aside.  Thus, although thus only, can you recover your
neglected opportunities.  Do this in hope and meekness, and God will
make up to you for the lost past; He Who inhabiteth eternity will
stretch forth out of His eternity a forgiving hand, and touch into green
leaf again the years which the locust hath eaten."  How eagerly Walter
Evson drank in those words!  That day at least he felt that man doth not
live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth
of God.

If Walter had been old enough to be an observer of character, he might
have gathered out of his difficulties the materials for some curious
observation on the manner in which he was treated by different boys.
Many, like Harpour and Cradock, made, of course, no sort of difference
in their behaviour towards him, because they set up no pretence of
condemnation; others, like Anthony and Franklin, had been nearly as bad
as himself in the matter, and therefore their relations to him remained
quite unaltered.  But there were many boys who, like Jones, either cut
him or were cold to him, not because they really felt any moral anger at
a fault which was much less heinous in reality than many which they
daily committed, but because he was, for the time, unpopular, and they
did not care to be seen with an unpopular boy.  On the other hand,
through a feeling, which at the time they could not understand, a few of
the very best boys, some of the wisest, the steadiest, the noblest,
seemed drawn to him by some new tie; and in a very short time he began
to know friends among them in whose way he might not otherwise have been
thrown.  Daubeny, for instance, than whom, although the boys chose to
make him something of a butt, there was no more conscientious fellow at
Saint Winifred's, sought Walter out on every possible occasion, and when
they were alone spoke to him, in his gentle and honest way, many a
cheering and kindly word.  Another friend of this sort (whom Walter
already knew slightly through Kenrick, who was in the form below him),
was a boy named Power.  There was something in Power most attractive:
his clear eyes, and innocent expression of face, his unvarying success
in all school competitions, his quiet and graceful manners, and even the
coldness and reserve which made him stand somewhat aloof from the herd
of boys, mixing with very few of them, firmly and unobtrusively assuming
an altogether higher tone than theirs, and bestowing his confidence and
friendship on hardly any--all tended to make him a marked character, and
to confer on his intimacy an unusual value.  Walter, to whom as yet he
had hardly spoken, thought him self-centred and reserved, and yet saw
something beautiful and fascinating even in his exclusiveness; he felt
that he could have liked him much, but, as he was several forms lower
than Power, never expected to become one of his few associates.  But
during his troubles Power so openly showed that he regarded him with
respect and kindness, and was so clearly the first to make advances,
that Walter gladly and gratefully accepted the proffered friendship.

It happened thus: One day, about a fortnight after his last escapade,
Walter was amusing himself alone, as he often did, upon the shore.  The
shore was very dear to him.  I almost pity a boy whose school is not by
the seaside.  He found on the shore both companionship and occupation.
He never felt lonely there.  He could sit there by the hour, either in
calm or storm, watching the sea-birds dip their wings which flashed in
the sunlight, as they pounced down on some unwary fish; or listening to
the silken rustle and sweet monotony of the waves plashing musically
upon the yellow sands on some fine day.  On this evening the tide was
coming in, and Walter had amused himself by standing on some of the
lumps of granite tossed about the shore until the advancing waves
encroached upon and surrounded his little island, and gave him just room
to jump to land.  He was standing on one of these great stones watching
the sunset, and laughing to himself at the odd gambols of two or three
porpoises that kept rolling about in a futile manner across the little
bay, when he heard a pleasant voice say to him--

"I say, Evson, are you going to practise the old style of martyrdom--tie
yourself to a stake and let the tide gradually drown you?"

Looking round he was surprised to see Power standing alone on the sands,
and to see also that his little island was so far surrounded that he
could not get to shore without being wet up to the knees.

"Hallo!" he said; "I see I must take off my shoes and stockings, and
wade."

But on the slippery piece of rock upon which he was standing he had no
room to do this without losing his balance and tumbling over; so Power
had in a moment taken off his own shoes and stockings, turned up his
trousers above the knees, and waded up to him.

"Now," he said, "get on my back, and I'll carry you in unwetted."

"Thanks, Power," he said, as Power deposited him on the sand; "I'm much
obliged."

Not knowing whether Power would like to be seen with him or not, he
looked at him shyly, and was walking off in another direction, when
Power, who was putting on his stockings again, said to him playfully--

"What, Walter; haven't you the grace to wait for me, after my having
delivered you from such a noyade?  Excuse my calling you Walter; I hear
Kenrick and Henderson do it, and somehow you're one of those fellows
whom one meets now and then, whose Christian name seems to suit them
more naturally than the other."

"By all means call me Walter, Power; and I'll wait for you gladly if you
like," said Walter, blushing as he added, "I thought you might not like
to walk with me."

"Not like?  Nonsense.  I should like it particularly.  Let's take a turn
along the shore; we shall just have time before roll-call."

Walter pointed out to him the droll porpoises which had absorbed his
attention, and while they stood looking and laughing at them, Henderson
came up unobserved, and patting Walter on the back, observed
poetically--

  "Why are your young hearts sad, oh beautiful children of morning?
  Why do your young eyes gaze timidly over the sea?"

"Where _did_ you crib that quotation from, Flip," asked Power laughing;
"your mind's like a shallow brook, and the colour of it always shows the
stratum through which you have been flowing last."

"Shallow brook, quotha?" said Henderson; "a deep and mighty river, sir,
you mean; irresistible by any Power."

"Oh, _do_ shut up.  Why was I born with a name that could be punned on?
No more puns, Flip, if you love me," said Power; and they all three
walked under the noble Norman archway that formed the entrance to the
school.

"By the powers," said Henderson to Walter, as the other left them, "you
_have_ got a new friend worth having, Walter.  _He_ doesn't make himself
at home with every one, I can tell you; and if he and Dubbs cultivate
you, I should think it's about time for anyone else to be ashamed of
cutting you, my boy."

"I'm quite happy now," said Walter; "with you and Kenrick and him for
friends.  I don't care so much for the rest.  I wonder why he likes me?"

"Well, because he thinks the fellows a great deal too hard on you for
one thing.  How very good and patient you've been, Walter, under it
all."

"It is hard sometimes, Flip, but I deserve it.  Only now and then I'm
afraid that you and Ken will get quite tired of me, I've so few to speak
to.  Harpour and that lot would be glad enough that I should join them,
I know, and but for you and Ken I should have been driven to do it."

"Never mind, Walter, my boy; the fellows'll come round in time."

So, step by step, with the countenance of some true and worthy friends,
and by the help of a stout and uncorrupted heart, by penitence and by
kindliness, did our brave little Walter win his way.  He was helped,
too, greatly, by his achievements in the games.  At football he played
with a vigour and earnestness which carried everything before it.  He
got several bases, and was the youngest boy in the school who ever
succeeded in doing this.  Gradually but surely his temporary
unpopularity gave way; and even before he began to be generally
recognised again, he bade fair _ultimately_ to gain a high position in
the estimation of all his schoolfellows.

There was one scene which he long remembered, and which was very trying
to go through.  One fine afternoon the boys' prize for the highest jump
was to be awarded, and as the school were all greatly interested in the
competition, they were assembled in a dense circle in the green
playground, leaving space for the jumpers in the middle.  The fine
weather had also tempted nearly all the inhabitants of Saint Winifred's
to be spectators of the contest, and numbers of ladies were present, for
whom the boys had politely left a space within the circle.  When the
chief jumping prize had been won by an active fellow in the sixth-form,
another prize was proposed for all boys under fifteen.

Bliss, Franklin, and two other boys at once stepped into the circle as
competitors, and threw off their jackets.

"You must go in for this, Walter," said Henderson.  "You're sure to get
it."

"Not I.  I won't go in, Flip," said Walter, who was naturally in a
desponding mood, as he looked round on those four hundred faces, and saw
among them all scarcely one sympathising glance.  "_You_ go in and win.
And never mind talking to me up here, Henderson; it can't be pleasant
for you, I know, when all the other fellows are cutting me."

"Pooh!  Walter.  _They're_ in the wrong box; not you and I.  `Athanasius
contra mundum,' as Power says.  Do go in for the prize."

Walter shook his head gloomily.  "I don't like to, before all these
fellows.  They'd hiss me or something."

"Well, if _you_ won't, _I_ won't; that's flat."

"O do, Henderson.  I'm sure you'd get it.  Don't ask me to go in, that's
a good fellow."

"None but these four going in for the little jump?  What, only four?"
said one of the young athletes, who carried little blue flags, and
arranged the preliminaries.  "Come in some more of you."

"Here are two more," said Henderson; "stick down our names--Henderson
and Evson"; and pulling Walter forward with him inside the circle, he
sat down and began to take off his shoes, that he might run and jump
more easily on the turf.

Thus prominently mentioned, Walter could hardly draw back, so putting
the best face on it he could, he, too, flung off his jacket and shoes.

The movable spar of wood over which the boys jumped was first put at a
height of three feet, which they could all easily manage, and the six,
one after another, cleared it lightly.  Even then, however, it was
pretty easy to judge by their action which was the best jumper, and the
connoisseurs on the field at once decided that the chance lay between
Henderson and Walter; Walter was by far the most active and graceful
jumper, but Henderson had the advantage of being a little the taller of
the two.

The spar was raised half an inch each time, and when it had attained the
height of three feet and a half, two of the candidates failed to clear
it after three trials.

Bliss was the next to break down.  His awkward jumps had excited a great
deal of laughter, and when he finally failed, Henderson found time even
then to begin a line or two of his monody on Blissidas, which was a
standing joke against poor Bliss, who always met it by the same
invariable observation of "I'll lick you afterwards, Flip."

Only three competitors were now left--Franklin, Henderson, and Walter--
and they jumped on steadily till they had reached the height of four
feet and one inch, and then Franklin broke down, but recovered himself
in the second chance.

The struggle now became very exciting, and as Franklin and Henderson
again cleared the bar at the height of four feet four, each of them were
loudly clapped.  But Walter--who jumped last always, because he had been
the last candidate to come forward--although he cleared it with an easy
bound, received no sign of encouragement from any of the boys.  He
cleared it in perfect silence, only broken by Mr Paton, who was looking
on with a group of other masters, and who said encouragingly, "Very well
done, Evson; capital!"

The bar was raised an inch, and again the three boys cleared it, and
again the first two were greeted with applause, and Walter was left
unnoticed except by Power and Kenrick, who applauded him heartily, and
patted him on the back.  But indeed their clapping only served to throw
into stronger relief the loud applause which the others received.
Walter almost wished that they would desist.  He was greatly agitated;
and his friends saw that he was trembling with emotion.  He had been
much mortified the first time to be thus pointedly scorned in so large a
crowd of strangers, and made a marked object of reprobation before them
all; but that this open shame should be thus _steadily_ and
_continuously_ put upon him, made his heart swell with sorrow and
indignation at the ungenerous and unforgiving spirit of his
schoolfellows.

Once more the bar was raised an inch.  The other two got over it amid a
burst of applause, and this time Walter, who was unnerved by the painful
circumstances in which he found himself, brushed against it as he came
over, and knocked it off.  The bar was replaced, and at his second trial
(for three were allowed) he jumped so well that he flew easily over it.
Always before, a boy who had recovered himself after a failure had been
saluted with double cheering, but again Walter's proceedings were
observed by that large crowd in dead silence, while he could not help
overhearing the whispered queries which asked an explanation of so
unusual a circumstance.

"Why don't they cheer him as well as the others?" asked a fair young
girl of her brother.  "He looks such a nice boy."

"Because he did a very shabby thing not long ago," was the reply.

He could stand it no longer.  He glanced round at the speakers more in
sorrow than in anger, and then, instead of returning to the
starting-point, he turned hastily aside, and, declining the contest,
plunged into the thickest of the crowd.  "Evson's giving it up.  What a
pity!" said several boys.

"No wonder he's giving it up," said Power indignantly, "after the way
you fellows treat him.  Never mind them, Walter," he said, taking him by
the arm; "they will be ashamed of themselves by and by."

"You're not going to withdraw, Evson?" asked one of the chief athletes,
in a kind tone.

"Yes," said Walter, retiring still farther to hide himself amid the
crowd.

"Nonsense!" said Henderson, who had heard the answer; "come, Walter,
it'll spoil all the fun if you don't go on."

"I can't, Flip," said Walter, turning aside, and hastily brushing away
the tears which _would_ come into his eyes.

"Do, Walter, they all wish it," whispered Henderson; "be brave, and get
the prize in spite of all; here's Paton coming round; I'm sure it's to
cheer you up."

"Very well, Flip, I will, if it pleases you; but it's rather hard," he
said, fairly bursting into tears.  "Remember, it's only for your sake I
do it, Flip."

"Go on, Walter; don't give way," said Mr Paton aloud, in his gentlest
and most encouraging voice, as the boy hastily re-entered the arena, and
took his place.

This time Franklin finally broke down, Henderson barely scrambled over,
and Walter, nerved by excitement and indignation, cleared the bar by a
brilliant flying leap.  There was no mistake about the applause this
time.  The boys had seen how their coolness had told on him.  They were
touched by the pluck he showed in spite of his dejected look, and as
though to make up for their former deficiency, they clapped him as loud
as either of the others.

And now a spirited contest began between Henderson and Walter.  Four
feet six and a half they both accomplished--Walter the first time, and
Henderson the third.  When Henderson, at his last trial, barely
succeeded, a loud shout rose from the field, quite enthusiastic enough
to show that the wishes of the school were on his side.  This decided
Walter, for he too was anxious that Henderson, who had set his heart
upon the prize, and was now quite eager with emulation, should be the
successful competitor.  At four feet seven, therefore, he meant to break
down, but, at the same time, to clear the bar so nearly each time of
trial, that it might not be _obvious_ to any one that he was not putting
forth his best strength.  The first time, however, he jumped so
carelessly that Henderson suspected his purpose, and, therefore, the
second time he exerted himself a little more, and, to his own
astonishment, accomplished the leap without having intended to do so.
Henderson also just succeeded in managing it, and as Walter refused to
try another half inch, the prize was declared, amid loud cheers, to be
equally divided between them, after the best competition that ever had
been known.

The boys and the spectators now moved off to the pavilion, where the
prizes were to be distributed by Mrs Lane.  But when Walter's name was
called out with Henderson's, only the latter stepped forward.  Walter
had disappeared; and the boys were again made to feel, by his voluntary
absence, what bitterness of heart their unkind conduct caused him.

Henderson took the prize for his friend, when he received his own.  The
prizes were a silver-mounted riding-whip, and a belt with a silver
clasp, and Mrs Lane told Henderson that she was sorry for the other
victor's absence, and that either of them might choose whichever prize
he liked best.  When the crowd had dispersed Henderson, knowing Walter's
haunts, strolled with Kenrick to a little fir-grove on the slope of
Bardlyn Hill, not far above the sea.  Here, as they expected, they found
Walter.  He was sitting in a listless attitude, with his back towards
them, and he started as he heard their footsteps.

  "You let yourself be beaten, Evson Walter,
  And afterwards you proved a base defaulter,"

said Henderson, who was in high spirits, as he clapped his hands on
Walter's shoulders, and continued--

  "Behold I bring you now the silver prizes,
  Meant to reward your _feets_ and exercises."

Even Walter could not help smiling at this sally, but he said at once,
"You must keep both prizes, Flip; I don't mean to take either--indeed I
won't; I shouldn't have gone in at all but for you."

"Oh, do take one," said Kenrick; "the fellows will think you too proud
if you don't."

"I don't care what they think of me, Ken; you saw how they treated me.
Flip, I'd take the prize in a minute to please you, but, indeed, it
would only remind me constantly of this odious jumping, and I'd much
rather not."

"I can't take _both_ prizes, Walter," said Henderson.

"Well, I'll tell you what--give one to Franklin; he jumped very well,
and he's not half a bad fellow.  Don't press me, Flip; I can't refuse
you anything if you do, because you've been so very, very kind; but you
don't know how wretched I feel."

Henderson, who had looked annoyed, cleared up in a moment.

"All right, Walter; it shall be as you like.  Franklin shall have it.
You've had quite enough to bear already.  So cheer up, and come along."

It was soon known in the school how Walter had yielded the prize to
Franklin, and it was known, too, that next day he had gone to jump with
Henderson, Franklin, and some others, and had cleared the bar at four
feet eight, which none of them had been able to do.  The boys admired
his conduct throughout; and from that day forward many were as anxious
to renew an acquaintance with him as they had previously been to break
it off.

And there was an early opportunity of testing this; for a few days after
the scene just described the champion race for boys under fifteen was
tried for, and when Walter won it by accomplishing the distance in the
shortest time that had yet been known, and by distancing the other
runners, he was received with a cheer, which was all the more hearty
because the boys were anxious to do him a tardy justice.  If Walter had
not been too noble to be merely patronised, and too reserved to be
"hail-fellow-well-met" with every one, he would have fallen more easily
and speedily into the position which he now slowly but honourably
recovered.

It need hardly be said that, in his school work, Walter struggled with
all his might to give satisfaction to Mr Paton, and to spare him from
all pain.  There was something really admirable in the way he worked,
and taxed himself even beyond his strength, to prove his regret for Mr
Paton's loss, by doing all that was required of him.  Naturally quick
and lively as he was, he sat as quiet and attentive in school, as if he
had been gifted with a disposition as unmercurial as that of Daubeny
himself.  In order to make sure of his lessons, he went over them with
Henderson (who entered eagerly into his wishes) with such care, that
they, both of them, astonished themselves with their own improving
progress.  If they came to any insuperable difficulties, Kenrick or
Power gladly helped them, and explained everything to them with that
sympathetic clearness of instruction which makes one boy the best
teacher to another.  The main difficulty still continued to be the
repetition, and grammar rules; but in order to know them, at least by
rote, Walter would get up with the earliest gleam of daylight, and would
put on his trousers and waistcoat after bed-time, and go and sit, book
in hand, under the gaslight in the passage.  This was hard work,
doubtless; but it brought its own reward in successful endeavour and an
approving conscience.  Under this discipline his memory rapidly grew
retentive; no difficulty can stand the assaults of such batteries as
these, and Walter was soon free from all punishments, and as happy as
the day was long.

One little cloud alone remained--the continued and obvious displeasure
of his tutor, and one or two of Mr Paton's chief friends among the
masters.  One of these was Mr Edwards, who, among other duties, had the
management of the chapel choir.  But at length Mr Edwards gave him a
distinguished proof of his returning respect.  He sat near Walter in
chapel, and the hymn happened to be one which came closely home to
Walter's heart after his recent troubles.  This made him join with great
feeling in the singing, and the choirmaster was struck with the strength
and rare sweetness of his voice.  As he left the chapel, Mr Edwards
said to him, "Evson, there is a vacancy for a treble in the choir; I
heard you sing in chapel to-day, and I think that you would supply the
place very well.  Should you like to join?"

Walter very gladly accepted the offer, partly because he hailed the
opportunity of learning a little about music, and because the choir boys
were allowed several highly-valued and exceptional privileges; but
chiefly because they were always chosen by the masters with express
reference to character, and therefore the invitation to join their
number was the clearest proof that could be given him that the past was
condoned.

The last to offer him the right-hand of forgiveness, but the best and
warmest friend to him when once he had done so, was Mr Percival.  He
still passed him with only the coldest and most distant recognition, for
he not only felt Mr Paton's loss with peculiar sorrow, but was also
vexed and disappointed that a boy whose character he had openly defended
should have proved so unworthy of his encomium.  It happened that the
_only_ time that Walter was ever again sent to detention was for a
failure in a long lesson, including much which had been learnt on the
morning that he was out of school, which, in consequence, he found it
impossible, with all his efforts, to master.  Mr Paton saw how
mortified and pained he was to fail, and when he sent him to detention,
most kindly called him up, and told him that he saw the cause of his
unsuccess, and was not _in the least_ displeased at it, although, as he
had similarly punished other boys, he could not make any exception to
the usual rule of punishment.  On this occasion, it was again Mr
Percival's turn to sit with the _detenus_, and seeing Walter among them,
he too hastily concluded that he was still continuing a career of
disgrace.

"What! you here again?" he said with chilling scorn, as he passed the
seat where Walter sat writing.  "After what has happened, I should have
been ashamed to be sent here, if I were you."

After his days and nights of toil, after his long, manly, noble struggle
to show his penitence, after his heavy and disproportionate punishment,
it was hard to be so addressed by one whom he respected, in the presence
of all the idlest in the school, and in consequence of a purely
accidental and isolated failure.  Walter looked up with an appealing
look in his dark blue eyes; but Mr Percival had passed on, and he bent
his head over his paper with the old sense that the past could _never_
be forgotten, the recollection of his disgrace _never_ obliterated.  No
one was observing him; and as the feeling of despair grew in him, a
large tear dropped down upon his paper; he wiped it quietly away, and
continued writing, but another and another fell, and he could not help
it.  For Mr Percival was almost the only master whose goodwill he very
strongly coveted, and whose approval he was most anxious to attain.

When next Mr Percival stopped and looked at Walter, he saw that his
words had wounded him to the heart, and knew well why the boy's lines
were blurred and blotted, when he showed them up with a timid hand and
downcast look.

He was touched.  "I have been too hard on you, Evson," he said; "I see
it now.  Come to tea with me after chapel this evening; I want to speak
with you."



CHAPTER ELEVEN.

HAPPIER HOURS.

  "Sir, you are one of those that will not serve God if the devil bid
  you."

  Othello, act 1, scene 1.

When chapel was over, Walter, having brushed his hair, and made himself
rather neater and more spruce than a schoolboy usually is at the middle
of a long half, went to Mr Percival's room.  Mr Percival, having been
detained, had not yet come in; but Henderson, Kenrick, and Power, who
had also been asked to tea, were there waiting for him when Walter
arrived, and Henderson, as usual, amusing the others and himself with a
flood of mimicry and nonsense.

"You know that mischievous little Penkridge," said Kenrick; "he nearly
had an accident this morning.  We were in the classroom, and Edwards was
complaining of the bad smell of the room--"

"Bad smell!" interrupted Henderson, "I'll bet you what you like Edwards
didn't say bad smell.  _He's_ not the man to call a spade a spade; he
calls it an agricultural implement for the trituration of the soil."

"Why, what _should_ he say?" asked Kenrick, "if he didn't say `bad
smell'?"

"Why, `What a malodorous effluvium!'" said Henderson, imitating exactly
the master's somewhat drawling tone; "`what a con-cen-trra-ted malarious
miasma; what an unendurable'--I say Power, give us the Greek, or Hebrew,
or Kamschatkan, for `smell.'"

"Odwde," suggested Power.

"That's it to a T," said Henderson; "I bet you he observed, `What an
un-en-duu-rrable osus.'  Now, didn't he?  Confess the truth."

"Well, I believe he did say something of the kind," said Kenrick,
laughing; "at least I know he called it Stygian and Tartarean.  But, as
I was saying, he set Penkridge (who happened to be going round with the
lists) to examine the cupboards, and see if by chance some inopportune
rat had died there; and Penkridge, opening one of them where the floor
was very rotten, and poking about with his foot, knocked a great piece
of plaster off the great schoolroom ceiling, and was as nearly as
possible putting his foot through it."

"Fancy if he had," said Walter, "how astonished we should have been down
below.  I say, Henderson, what _would_ Paton have said?"

"Oh!  Paton," said Henderson, delighted with any opportunity for
mimicry, "he'd have whispered quietly, in an emotionless voice,
`Penkridge, Penkridge, come here--come here, Penkridge.  This is a very
unusual method, Penkridge, of entering a room--highly irregular.  If you
haven't broken your leg or your arm, Penkridge, you must write me two
hundred lines.'"

"And Robertson?" asked Kenrick.

"Oh!  Robertson--he'd have put up his eye-glass," said Henderson, again
exactly hitting off the master's attitude, "and he'd have observed, `Ah!
Penkridge has fallen through the floor; probably fractured some bones.
Slippery fellow, he won't be able to go to the Fighting Cocks _this_
afternoon, at any rate.'  Whereupon Stevens would have gone up to him
with the utmost tenderness, and asked him if he was hurt; and Penkridge,
getting up, would, by way of gratitude, have grinned in his face."

"Well, you'd better finish the scene," said Power; "what would Percival
have said?"

"Thunder-and-lightning?  Oh! that's easy to decide; he'd have made two
or three quotations; he'd have immediately called the attention of the
form to the fact that Penkridge had been:--

  "`Flung by angry Jove
  Sheer o'er the crystal battlements; from morn
  Till noon he fell, from noon till dewy eve;
  A winter's day, and as the tea-bell rang,
  Shot from the ceiling like a falling star
  On the great schoolroom floor.'"

"Would he, indeed?" said Mr Percival, pinching Henderson's ear, as he
came in just in time to join in the laugh which this parody occasioned.

Tea at Saint Winifred's is a regular and recognised institution.  There
are few nights on which some of the boys do not adjourn after chapel to
tea at the masters' houses, when they have the privilege of sitting up
an hour and a half later.  The masters generally adopt this method of
seeing their pupils and the boys in whom they are interested.  The
institution works admirably; the first and immediate result of it is,
that here boys and masters are more intimately acquainted, and being so,
are on warmer and friendlier terms with each other than perhaps at any
other school--certainly on warmer terms than if they never met except in
the still and punishment-pervaded atmosphere of the schoolrooms; and the
second and remoter result is, that not only in the matter of work
already alluded to, but also in other and equally important particulars,
the tone and character of Saint Winifred's boys is higher and purer than
it would otherwise be.  There is a simplicity and manliness there which
cannot fail to bring forth its rich fruits of diligence, truthfulness,
and honour.  Many are the boys who have come from thence, who, in the
sweet yet sober dignity of their life and demeanour, go far to realise
the beautiful ideal of Christian boyhood.  Many are the boys there who
are walking, through the gates of humility and diligence, to certain,
and merited, and conspicuous honour.

I know that there are many who believe in none of these things, and care
not for them; who repudiate the necessity and duty of early godliness;
who set up no ideal at all, because to do so would expose them to the
charge of sentiment or enthusiasm, a charge which they dread more than
that of villainy itself.  These men regard the heart as a muscle
consisting of four cavities, called respectively the auricles and the
ventricles, and useful for no other purpose but to aerate the blood; all
other meanings of the word they despise or ignore.  They regard the
world not as a scene of probation, not as a passage to a newer and
higher life, but as a "convenient feeding-trough" for every low passion
and unworthy impulse; as a place where they can build on the foundation
of universal scepticism a reputation for superior ability.  This
degradation of spirit, this premature cynicism, this angry sneering at a
tone superior to their own, this addiction to a low and lying satire,
which is the misbegotten child of envy and disbelief, has infected our
literature to a deplorable and almost hopeless extent.  It might be
sufficient to leave it, in all its rottenness and inflation, to every
good man's silent scorn, if it had not also so largely tainted the
intellect of the young.  If, in popular papers or magazines, boys are to
read that, in a boy, lying is natural and venial; that courtesy to, and
love for, a master, is impossible or hypocritical; that swearing and
corrupt communication are peccadilloes which none but preachers and
pedagogues regard as discreditable--how can we expect success to the
labours of those who toil all their lives, amid neglect and ingratitude,
to elevate the boys of England to a higher and holier view?  I have seen
this taint of _atheistic disregard for sin_ poison article after
article, and infuse its bitter principle into many a young man's heart;
and worse than this--adopted as it is by writers whom some consider to
be mighty in intellect and leaders of opinion, I have seen it corrode
the consciences and degrade the philosophy of far better and far
worthier men.

It is a solemn duty to protest, with all the force of heart and
conscience, against this dangerous gospel of sin, this "giving to
manhood's vices the privilege of boyhood."  It was _not_ the gospel
taught at Saint Winifred's; there we were taught that we were baptised
Christian boys, that the seal of God's covenant was on our foreheads,
that the oath of His service was on our consciences, that we were His
children, and the members of His Son, and the inheritors of His kingdom;
that His laws were our safeguard, and that our bodies were the temples
of His Spirit.  We were not taught--_that_ was left for the mighty
intellects of this age to discover--that as we were boys, a Christian
principle and a Christian standard were above our comprehension, and
alien from our possible attainments; we did not believe then, nor will I
now, that a clear river is likely to flow from a polluted stream, or a
good tree grow from bitter fibres and cankered roots.

Walter and the others spent a very happy evening with Mr Percival.
When tea was over they talked as freely with him, and with each other in
his presence, as they would have done among themselves; and the
occasional society of their elders and superiors was in every way good
for them.  It enlarged their sympathies, widened their knowledge, and
raised their moral tone.

Among many other subjects that evening they talked over one which never
fails to interest deeply every right-minded boy--I mean their homes.  It
was no wonder that, as Walter talked of the glories of Semlyn lake and
its surrounding hills, his face lighted up, and his eyes shone with
pleasant memories.  Mr Percival, as he looked at him, felt more puzzled
than ever at his having gone wrong, and more confirmed than ever in the
opinion that he had been hard and unjust to him of late, and that his
original estimate of him was the right one after all.

Power's home was a statelier one than Walter's.  His father, Sir
Lawrence Power, was a baronet, the owner of broad acres, whose large and
beautiful mansion stood on one of the undulations in a park shadowed by
ancestral trees, under whose boughs the deer fed with their graceful
fawns around them.  Through the park flowed a famous river, of which the
windings were haunted by herons and kingfishers, and the pleasant waters
abounded in trout and salmon.  And to this estate and title Power was
heir; though of course he did not tell them this while he spoke of the
lovely scenery around the home where his fathers had so long lived.

Henderson, again, was the son of a rich merchant, who had two houses--
one city and one suburban.  He was a regular little man of the world.
After the holidays he had always seen the last feats of Saltori, and
heard the most recent strains of Tiralirini.  He always went to a round
of entertainments, and would make you laugh by the hour while he sang
the songs or imitated the style of the last comic actor or Ethiopian
minstrel.

While they were chatting over their holiday amusements and occupations,
Kenrick said little; and, wondering at his silence, Mr Percival asked
him in what part of the world he lived.

"I, sir?" he said, as though awaked from a reverie; "Oh, I live at
Fuzby, a village on the border of the fens, and in the very middle of
the heavy clays."  And Kenrick turned away his head.

"Don't abuse the clay," said Walter to cheer him up; "I'm very fond of
the clay; it produces good roses and good strawberries--and those are
the two best things going, in any soil."

"Half-past ten, youngsters," said Mr Percival, holding up his watch;
"off with you to bed.  Let yourselves in through the grounds; here's the
key.  Good-night to you.  Walter," he said, calling him back as he was
about to leave, "one word with you alone; you three wait for him a
moment outside.  I wanted to tell you that, although I have seemed harsh
to you, I dare say, of late, yet now I hear that you are making the most
honourable efforts, and I have quite forgotten the past.  My good
opinion of you, Walter, is quite restored; and whenever you want to be
quiet to learn your lessons, you may always come and sit in my room."

Mr Percival was not the only Saint Winifred's master who thus
generously abridged his own leisure and privacy to assist the boys in
what he felt an interest.  Walter thanked him with real gratitude, and
rejoined the other three.  "He's let me sit in his room," said Walter.

"Has he?" said Henderson; "so he has me.  How jolly! we shall get on
twice as well."

"What's that?" said Power, pointing upwards, as they walked through the
garden to their house door.

Glancing in the direction, Walter saw a light suddenly go out in his
dormitory, and a great bundle (apparently) disappear inside the window,
which was then shut down.

"I'll go and see," he said.  "Good-night, you fellows."

All was quiet when he reached his room, but one of the candles,
ineffectually extinguished, was still smoking, and when he looked to
Eden's bed he saw by the gaslight that shone through the open door, that
the child was awake, and crying bitterly.

"What's the matter, Eden?" he said kindly, sitting down upon his bed.

"If you peach," said Harpour and Jones together; "you know what you'll
get."

"Have you fellows been bullying poor little Eden?" asked Walter
indignantly.

"I've not," and "I've not," said Anthony and Franklin, who were better
than the rest in every way; and "I haven't touched the fellow, Evson,"
said Cradock, who meant no harm, and at Walter's earnest request had
never again annoyed Eden since the first night.

"Poor little Eden--poor little fiddlestick," said Jones, "it does the
young cub good."

"Send him home to his grandmamma, and let him have his bib and his
night-cap," growled Harpour; "is he made of butter, and are you afraid
of his melting, you Evson, that you make such a fuss with him?  You want
your lickings yourself, and shall have them if you don't look out."

"I don't care what you do to _me_, Harpour," rejoined Walter, "and I
don't think you'll do very much.  But I do tell you that it's a
blackguard shame for a great big fellow like you to torment a little
delicate chap like Eden; and what's more, you shan't do it."

"Shan't! my patience.  I like that I why, who is to prevent me?"

"I suppose he'll turn sneak, and peach," said Jones; "he'd do anything
that's mean, we all know."

Walter was always liable to that taunt now.  It was a part of his
punishment, and the one which lasted longest.  From any other boy he
might have winced under it; but really, coming from Jones, it was too
contemptible to notice.

"You shut up, Jones," he said angrily; "you shan't touch Eden again, I
can tell you, whatever Harpour does, and he'd better look out what he
does."

"Look out yourself," said Harpour, flinging a football boot at Walter's
head.

"You'll find your boot on the grass outside to-morrow morning," said
Walter, opening the window, and dropping it down.  He wasn't a bit
afraid, because he always went on the instinctive and never-mistaken
assumption, that a bully must be a coward in his inmost nature.  Cruelty
to the weaker is incompatible with the generosity of all true courage.

"By Jove, I'll thrash you for that to-morrow," shouted Harpour.

"_To-morrow_!" said Walter with great contempt.

"Oh, don't make him angry, Walter," whispered Eden; "you know what a
strong fellow he is," (Eden shuddered, as though _he_ had reason to
know); "and you can't fight him; and you mustn't get a thrashing for my
sake.  I'm not worth that.  I'd rather bear it myself, Walter--indeed I
would."

"Good-night, poor little Eden," said Walter; "you're safe to-night at
any rate.  Why, how cold you are!  What _have_ they been doing to you?"

"I daren't tell you to-night, Walter; I will to-morrow," he answered in
a low tone, shivering all over.

"Well, then, go to sleep now, my little man; and don't you be afraid of
Harpour or any one else.  I won't let them bully you if I can help it."

Eden squeezed Walter's hand tight, and sobbed his thanks, while Walter
gently smoothed the child's pillow and dried his tears.

Poor Eden! as I said before, he was too weak, too delicate, too tenderly
nurtured, and far, far too young for the battle of life in a public
school.  For even at Saint Winifred's, as there are and must be at all
great schools, there were some black sheep in the flock undiscovered,
and therefore unseparated from the rest.



CHAPTER TWELVE.

MY BROTHER'S KEEPER.

  "'Tis in ourselves that we are thus or thus.
  Our bodies are gardens to the which our wills are gardeners."

  Othello, Act One Scene 3.

As Walter lay awake for a few quiet moments before he sent his thoughts
to rest, he glanced critically, like an Indian gymnosophist, over the
occurrences of the day.  He could not but rejoice that the last person
for whom he felt real regard had forgiven him his rash act, and that his
offence had thus finally been absolved on earth as in heaven.  He
rejoiced, too, that Mr Percival's kind permission to learn his lessons
in his room would give him far greater advantages and opportunities than
he had hitherto enjoyed.  Yet Walter's conscience was not quite at ease.
The last scene had disturbed him.  The sobs and shiverings of little
Eden had fallen very reproachfully into his heart.  Walter felt that he
might have done far more for him than he had done.  He had, indeed, even
throughout his own absorbing troubles, extended to the child a general
protection, but not a special care.  It never occurred to him to excuse
himself with the thought that he was "not his brother's keeper."  The
truth was that he had found Eden uninteresting, because he had not taken
the pains to be interested in him, and while one voice within his heart
reproved him of neglect and selfishness, another voice seemed to say to
him, in a firm yet kindlier tone, "Now that thou are converted,
strengthen thy brethren."

For indeed as yet Eden's had been a very unhappy lot.  Bullied, teased,
and persecuted by the few among whom accident had first thrown him, and
judged to belong to their set by others who on that account considered
him a boy of a bad sort, he was almost friendless at Saint Winifred's.
And the loneliness, the despair of this feeling, weighing upon his
heart, robbed him of all courage to face the difficulties of work, so
that in school as well as out of it, he was always in trouble.  He was
for ever clumsily scrawling in his now illegible hand the crooked and
blotted lines of punishment which his seeming ignorance or sluggishness
brought upon him; and although he was always to be seen at detention, he
almost hailed this disgrace as affording him at least some miserable
shadow of occupation, and a refuge, however undesirable, from the
torments of those degraded few to whom his childish tears, his weak
entreaties, his bursts of impotent passion, caused nothing but low
amusement.  Out of school his great object always was to hide himself;
anywhere, so as to be beyond the reach of Jones, Harpour, and other
bullies of the same calibre.  For this purpose he would conceal himself
for a whole afternoon at a time up in the fir-groves, listlessly
gathering into heaps the red sheddings of their umbrage, and pulling to
pieces their dry and fragrant cones; or, when he feared that these
resorts would be disturbed by some little gang of lounging smokers, he
would choose some lonely place, under the shadow of the mountain cliffs,
and sit for hours together, aimlessly rolling white lumps of quartz over
the shingly banks.  Under continued trials like these he became quite
changed.  The childish innocence and beauty of countenance, the childish
frankness and gaiety of heart, the childish quickness and intelligence
of understanding, were exchanged for vacant looks, stupid indifference,
and that half-cunning expression which is always induced by craven fear.
Accustomed, too, to be waited upon and helped continually in the home
where his mother, a gay young widow, had petted and spoiled him, he
became slovenly and untidy in dress and habits.  He rarely found time or
heart to write home, and even when he did, he so well knew that his
mother was incapable of sympathy or comprehension of his suffering, that
the dirty and ill-spelt scrawl rarely alluded to the one dim
consciousness that brooded over him night and day--that he couldn't
understand life, and only knew that he was a very friendless, unhappy,
unpitied little boy.  If he could have found even one to whom to unfold
and communicate his griefs, even one to love him unreservedly, all the
inner beauty and brightness of his character would have blown and
expanded in that genial warmth.  He once thought that in Walter he had
found such an one, but when he saw that his dullness bored Walter, and
that his listless manners and untidy habits made him cross, he shrank
back within himself.  He was thankful to Walter as a protector, but did
not look upon him as a friend in whom he could implicitly confide.  The
flower without sunshine will lose its colour and its perfume.  Six weeks
after Arthur Eden, a merry, bright-eyed child, alighted from his
mother's carriage at the old gate of Saint Winifred's school, no casual
stranger would have recognised him again in the pale and moping little
fellow who seemed to be afraid of every one whom he met.

Oh, if we knew how rare, how sweet, how deep human love can be, how
easily, yet how seldom it is gained, how inexpressible the treasure is
when once it _has_ been gained, we should not trample on human hearts as
lightly as most men do!  Any one who in that hard time had spoken a few
kindly words to Eden--any one who would have taken him gently for a
short while by the hand, and helped him over the stony places that hurt
his unaccustomed feet--any one who would have suffered, or who would
have invited him, to pour his sorrows into their ears and assist him to
sustain them--might have won, even at that slight cost, the deepest and
most passionate love of that trembling young heart.  He might have saved
him from hours of numbing pain, and won the rich reward of a gratitude
well-deserved and generously repaid.  There were many boys at Saint
Winifred's gentle-hearted, right-minded, of kindly and manly impulses;
but all of them, except Walter, lost this golden opportunity of
conferring pure happiness by disinterested good deeds.  They did not buy
up the occasion, which goes away and burns the priceless books she
offers, if they are not purchased unquestioningly and at once.

And Walter regretfully felt that he was very very nearly too late; so
nearly, that perhaps in a week or two more Eden might have lost
hopelessly, and for ever, all trace of self-respect--might have been
benumbed into mental imbecility by the torpedo-like influence of
helpless grief.  Walter felt as if he had been selfishly looking on
while a fellow-creature was fast sinking in the water, and as if it were
only at the last possible moment that he had held out a saving hand.
But, by God's grace, he _did_ hold out the saving hand at last, and it
was grasped firmly, and a dear life was saved.  Years after when Arthur
Eden had grown into--but stop, I must not so far anticipate my story.
Suffice it to say, that Walter's kindness to Eden, helped to bring about
long afterwards one of the chief happinesses of his own life.

"Come a stroll, Eden, before third school, and let's have a talk," he
said, as they came out from dinner in hall the next day.

Eden looked up happily, and he was proud to be seen by Walter's side in
the throng of boys, as they passed out, and across the court, and under
the shadow of the arch towards Walter's favourite haunt, the seashore.
Walter never felt weak or unhappy for long together, when the sweetness
of the sea-wind was on his forehead, and the song of the sea waves in
his ear.  A run upon the shore in all weathers, if only for five
minutes, was his daily pleasure and resource.

They sat down; the sea flashed before them a mirror of molten gold,
except where the summits of the great mountain of Appenfell threw their
deep broad shadows, which seemed purple by contrast with the brightness
over which they fell.  Walter sat, full of healthy enjoyment as he
breathed the pure atmosphere, and felt the delicious wind upon his
glowing cheeks; and Eden was happy to be with him, and to sit quietly by
his side.

"Eden," said Walter, after a few moments, "I'm afraid you've not been
happy lately."

The poor child shook his head, and answered, "No one cares for me here;
every one looks down on me, and is unkind; I've no friends."

"What, don't you count me as a friend, then?"

"Yes, Walter, you're very kind; I'm sure I _couldn't_ have lived here if
it hadn't been for you; but you're so much above me, and--"

Walter would not press him to fill up the omission, he could understand
the rest of the sentence for himself.

"You mustn't think I don't feel how good you've been to me, Walter,"
said the boy, drawing near to him, and taking his hand; "but--"

"Yes, yes," said Walter; "I understand it all.  Well, never mind, I
_will_ be a friend to you now."

A tear trembled on Eden's long eyelashes as he looked up quickly into
Walter's face.  "Will you, Walter? thank you, I have no other friend
here; and please--"

"Well, what is it?"

"Will you call me Arthur, as they do at home?"

Walter smiled.  "Well now," he said, "tell me what they were doing to
you last night?"

"You won't tell them I told you, Walter," he answered, looking round,
with the old look of decrepit fear usurping his face, which had
brightened for the moment.

"No, no," said Walter, impatiently; "why, what a little coward you are,
Eden."

The boy shrank back into himself as if he had received a blow, and
relaxed his grasp of Walter's hand; but Walter, struck with the
sensitive timidity which unkindness had caused, and sorry to have given
him pain in all his troubles, said kindly--

"There, Arty, never mind; I didn't mean it; don't be afraid; tell me
what they did to you.  I saw a light in our dormitory as I was coming
back from Percival's, and I saw something dragged through the window.
What was it?"

"That was me," said Eden naively.

"You?"

"Yes; poor me.  They let me down by a sheet which they tied round my
waist."

"What, from that high window?  I hope they tied you tight."

"Only one knot; I ever so nearly slipped out of it last night, and
that's what frightened me so, Walter."

"How horribly dangerous," said Walter indignantly.

"I know it is horribly dangerous," said Eden, standing up, and
gesticulating violently, in one of those bursts of passion which flashed
out of him now and then, and were the chief amusement of his
persecutors; "and I dream about it all night," he said, bursting into
tears, "and I know, I know that some day I shall slip, or the knot will
come undone, and I shall fall and be smashed to atoms.  But what do they
care for that? and I sometimes wish I were dead myself, to have it all
over."

"Hush, Arty, don't talk like that," said Walter, as he felt the little
soiled hand trembling with passion and emotion in his own.  "But what on
earth do they let you down for?"

"To go to--but you won't tell?" he said, looking round again.  "Oh, I
forgot, you didn't like my saying that.  But it's they who have made me
a coward, Walter; indeed it is."

"And no wonder," thought Walter to himself.  "But you needn't be afraid
any more," he said aloud; "I promise you that no one shall do anything
to you which they'd be afraid to do to me."

"Then I'm safe," said Eden, joyfully.  "Well, they made me go to--to
Dan's."

"Dan's? what, the fisherman's just near the shore."

"Yes; ugh!"

"But don't you know, Arty, that Dan's a brute, and a regular smuggler,
and that if you were caught going there, you'd be sent away?"

"Yes; you can't think, Walter, how I _hate_, and how frightened I am to
go there.  There's Dan, and there's that great lout of a wicked son of
his, and they're always drunk, and the hut--ugh! it's so nasty; and last
night Dan seized hold of me with his horrid red hand, and wanted me to
drink some gin, and I shrieked."  The very remembrance seemed to make
him shudder.

"Well, then, after that I was nearly caught.  I think, Walter, that even
you would be a coward if you had such long long frights.  You know that
to get to Dan's, after the gates are locked, the only way is to go over
the railing, and through Dr Lane's garden, and I'm always frightened to
death lest his great dog should be loose, and should catch hold of me.
He did growl last night.  And then as I was hurrying back--you know it
was rather moonlight last night, and not very cold--and who should I see
but the Doctor himself walking up and down the garden.  I crouched in a
minute behind a thick holly-tree, and I suppose I made a rustle, though
I held my breath, for the Doctor stopped and shook the tree, and said
`shoo,' as though he thought a cat were hidden there.  I was half dead
with fright, though I did hope, after all, that he would catch me, and
that I might be sent away from this horrid place.  But when he turned
round, I crept away, and made the signal, and they let down the sheet,
and then, as they were hauling me up, I heard voices--I 

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