Hugh wash his face and hands, they sat up in bed to stare. One of them told him that he had better not do that, as the maid would be coming for the light, and would leave him in the dark, and report of him if he was not in bed. So Hugh made a great splutter, and did not half dry his face, and left the water in the basin;--a thing which they told him was not allowed. He saw that the others had not kneeled down to say their prayers,--a practice which he had never omitted since he could say a prayer, except when he had the measles. He knew the boys were watching him; but he thought of his mother, and how she had taught him to pray at her knee. He hid himself as well as he could with the scanty bed-curtains, and kneeled. He could not attend to the words he said, while feeling that eyes were upon him; and before he had done, the maid came in for the candle. She waited; but when he got into bed, she told him that he must be quicker to-morrow night, as she had no time to spare waiting for the candle.
Hugh was more tired than he had ever been in his life. This had been the longest day he had ever known. It seemed more like a week than a day.
Yet he could not go to sleep. He had forgotten to ask Phil to be sure and wake him in time in the morning: and now he must keep awake till Phil came, to say this. Then, he could not but ask himself whether he liked, and should like, being at school as much as he expected; and when he felt how very unlike home it was, and how rough everybody seemed, and how Phil appeared almost as if he was ashamed of him, instead of helping him, he was so miserable he did not know what to do. He cried bitterly,--cried till his pillow was quite wet, and he was almost choked with his grief; for he tried hard not to let his sobs be heard. After awhile, he felt what he might do. Though he had kneeled he had not really prayed: and if he had, God is never weary of prayers. It was a happy thought to Hugh that his very best friend was with him still, and that he might speak to Him at any time. He spoke now in his heart; and a great comfort it was. He said-- "O God, I am all alone here, where nobody knows me; and everything is very strange and uncomfortable. Please, make people kind to me till I am used to them; and keep up a brave heart in me, if they are not. Help me not to mind little things; but to do my lessons well, that I may get to like being a Crofton boy, as I thought I should. I love them all at home very much,--better than I ever did before. Make them love me, and think of me every day,--particularly Agnes,--that they may be as glad as I shall be when I go home at Christmas."
This was the most of what he had to say; and he dropped asleep with the feeling that God was listening to him.
After a long while, as it seemed to him, though it was only an hour, there was a light and some bustle in the room. It was Phil and two others coming to bed.
"O Phil!" cried Hugh, starting bolt upright and winking with sleep,--"I meant to keep awake, to ask you to be sure and call me in the morning, time enough,--quite time enough, please."
The others laughed; and Phil asked whether he had not seen the bell, as he came; and what it should be for but to ring everybody up in the morning.
"But I might not hear it," pleaded Hugh.
"Not hear it? You'll soon see that."
"Well, but you will see that I really do wake, wont you?"
"The bell will take care of that, I tell you," was all he could get from Phil.
CHAPTER V.
CROFTON PLAY.
Hugh found, in the morning, that there was no danger of his not hearing the bell. Its clang clang startled him out of a sound sleep; and he was on his feet on the floor almost before his eyes were open. The boys who were more used to the bell did not make quite so much haste. They yawned a few times, and turned out more slowly; so that Hugh had the great tin wash basin to himself longer than the rest. There was a basin to every three boys; and, early as Hugh began, his companions were impatient long before he had done. At first, they waited, in curiosity to see what he was going to do after washing his face; when he went further, they began to quiz; but when they found that he actually thought of washing his feet, they hooted and groaned at him for a dirty brat.
"Dirty!" cried Hugh, facing them, amazed, "Dirty for washing my feet!
Mother says it is a dirty trick not to wash all over every day."
Phil told him that was stuff and nonsense here. There was no room and no time for such home-doings. The boys all washed their heads and feet on Saturdays. He would soon find that he might be glad to get his face and hands done in the mornings.
The other boys in the room were, or pretended to be, so disgusted with the very idea of washing feet in a basin, that they made Hugh rinse and rub out the tin basin several times before they would use it, and then there was a great bustle to get down stairs at the second bell. Hugh pulled his brother's arm, as Phil was brushing out of the room, and asked, in a whisper, whether there would be time to say his prayers.
"There will be prayers in the school-room. You must be in time for them," said Phil. "You had better come with me."
"Do wait one moment, while I just comb my hair."
Phil fidgeted, and others giggled, while Hugh tried to part his hair, as Susan had taught him. He gave it up, and left it rough, thinking he would come up and do it when there was nobody there to laugh at him.
The school-room looked chilly and dull, as there was no sunshine in it till the afternoon; and still Mr. Tooke was not there, as Hugh had hoped he would be. Mrs. Watson and the servants came in for prayers, which were well read by the usher; and then everybody went to business:--everybody but Hugh and Holt, who had nothing to do. Class after class came up for repetition; and this repetition seemed to the new boys an accomplishment they should never acquire. They did not think that any practice would enable them to gabble, as everybody seemed able to gabble here. Hugh had witnessed something of it before,--Phil having been wont to run off at home, "Sal, Sol, Ren et Splen," to the end of the passage, for the admiration of his sisters, and so much to little Harry's amusement, that Susan, however busy she might be, came to listen, and then asked him to say it again, that cook might hear what he learned at school. Hugh now thought that none of them gabbled quite so fast as Phil: but he soon found out, by a glance or two of Phil's to one side, that he was trying to astonish the new boys. It is surprising how it lightened Hugh's heart to find that his brother did not quite despise, or feel ashamed of him, as he had begun to think: but that he even took pains to show off. He was sorry too when the usher spoke sharply to Phil, and even rapped his head with the cane, asking him what he spluttered out his nonsense at that rate for. Thus ended Phil's display; and Hugh felt as hot, and as ready to cry, as if it had happened to himself.
Perhaps the usher saw this; for when he called Hugh up, he was very kind. He looked at the Latin grammar he had used with Miss Harold, and saw by the dogs'-ears exactly how far Hugh had gone in it, and asked him only what he could answer very well. Hugh said three declensions, with only one mistake. Then he was shown the part that he was to say to-morrow morning; and Hugh walked away, all the happier for having something to do, like everybody else. He was so little afraid of the usher, that he went back to him to ask where he had better sit.
"Sit! O! I suppose you must have a desk, though you have nothing to put in it. If there is a spare desk, you shall have it: if not, we will find a corner for you somewhere."
Some of the boys whispered that Mrs. Watson's foot-stool, under her apron, would do: but the usher overheard this, and observed that it took some people a good while to know a new boy; and that they might find that a little fellow might be as much of a man as a big one. And the usher called the oldest boy in the school, and asked him to see if there was a desk for little Proctor. There was: and Hugh put into it his two or three school-books, and his slate; and felt that he was now indeed a Crofton boy. Then, the usher was kinder than he had expected; and he had still to see Mr. Tooke, of whom he was not afraid at all. So Hugh's spirits rose, and he liked the prospect of breakfast as well as any boy in the school.
There was one more rebuff for him, first, however. He ran up to his room, to finish combing his hair, while the other boys were thronging into the long room to breakfast. He found the housemaids there, making the beds; and they both cried "Out! Out!" and clapped their hands at him, and threatened to tell Mrs. Watson of his having broken rules, if he did not go this moment. Hugh asked what Mrs. Watson would say to his hair, if he went to breakfast with it as it was. One of the maids was good-natured enough to comb it for him, for once: but she said he must carry a comb in his pocket; as the boys were not allowed to go to their rooms, except at stated hours.
At last, Hugh saw Mr. Tooke. When the boys entered school at nine o'clock, the master was at his desk. Hugh went up to his end of the room, with a smiling face, while Tom Holt hung back; and he kept beckoning Tom Holt on, having told him there was nothing to be afraid of. But when, at last, Mr. Tooke saw them, he made no difference between the two, and seemed to forget having ever seen Hugh. He told them he hoped they would be good boys, and would do credit to Crofton; and then he asked Mr. Carnaby to set them something to learn. And this was all they had to do with Mr. Tooke for a long while.
This morning in school, from nine till twelve, seemed the longest morning these little boys had ever known. When they remembered that the afternoon would be as long, and every morning and afternoon for three months, their hearts sank. Perhaps, if any one had told them that the time would grow shorter and shorter by use, and at last, when they had plenty to do, almost too short, they would not have believed it, because they could not yet feel it. But what they now found was only what every boy and girl finds, on beginning school, or entering upon any new way of life.
Mr. Carnaby, who was busy with others, found it rather difficult to fill up their time. When Hugh had said some Latin, and helped his companion to learn his first Latin lesson, and both had written a copy, and done a sum, Mr. Carnaby could not spare them any more time or thought, and told them they might do what they liked, if they only kept quiet, till school was up. So they made out the ridiculous figures which somebody had carved upon their desks, and the verses, half-rubbed out, which were scribbled inside: and then they reckoned, on their slates, how many days there were before the Christmas holidays;--how many school-days, and how many Sundays. And then Hugh began to draw a steamboat in the Thames, as seen from the leads of his father's house; while Holt drew on his slate the ship in which he came over from India. But before they had done, the clock struck twelve, school was up, and there was a general rush into the playground.
Now Hugh was really to see the country. Except that the sun had shone pleasantly into his room in the morning, through waving trees, nothing had yet occurred to make him feel that he was in the country. Now, however, he was in the open air, with trees sprinkled all over the landscape, and green fields stretching away, and the old church tower half-covered with ivy. Hugh screamed with pleasure; and nobody thought it odd, for almost every boy was shouting. Hugh longed to pick up some of the shining brown chesnuts which he had seen yesterday in the road, under the trees; and he was now cantering away to the spot, when Phil ran after him, and roughly stopped him, saying he would get into a fine scrape for the first day, if he went out of bounds.
Hugh had forgotten there were such things as bounds, and was not at all glad to be reminded of them now. He sighed as he begged Phil to show him exactly where he might go and where he might not. Phil did so in an impatient way, and then was off to trap-ball, because his party were waiting for him.
The chesnut-trees overhung one corner of the playground, within the paling: and in that corner Hugh found several chesnuts which had burst their sheaths, and lay among the first fallen leaves. He pocketed them with great delight, wondering that nobody had been before him to secure such a treasure. Agnes should have some; and little Harry would find them nice playthings. They looked good to eat too; and he thought he could spare one to taste: so he took out his knife, cut off the point of a fine swelling chesnut, and tasted a bit of the inside. Just as he was making a face over it, and wondering that it was so nasty, when those which his father roasted in the fire-shovel on Christmas-day were so good, he heard laughter behind him, and found that he was again doing something ridiculous, though he knew not what: and in a moment poor Hugh was as unhappy as ever.
He ran away from the laughing boys, and went quite to the opposite corner of the playground, where a good number of his school-fellows were playing ball under the orchard wall. Hugh ran hither and thither, like the rest, trying to catch the ball; but he never could do it; and he was jostled, and thrown down, and another boy fell over him; and he was told that he knew nothing about play, and had better move off.
He did so, with a heavy heart, wondering how he was ever to be like the other boys, if nobody would take him in hand, and teach him to play, or even let him learn. Remembering what his mother expected of him, he tried to sing, to prevent crying, and began to count the pales round the playground, for something to do. This presently brought him to a tree which stood on the very boundary, its trunk serving instead of two or three pales. It was only a twisted old apple-tree; but the more twisted and gnarled it was, the more it looked like a tree that Hugh could climb; and he had always longed to climb a tree. Glancing up, he saw a boy already there, sitting on the fork of two branches, reading.
"Have you a mind to come up?" asked the boy.
"Yes, sir, I should like to try to climb a tree. I never did."
"Well, this is a good one to begin with. I'll lend you a hand; shall I?"
"Thank you, sir."
"Don't call me, 'sir.' I'm only a school-boy, like you. I am Dan Firth.
Call me Firth, as I am the only one of the name here. You are little Proctor, I think--Proctor's brother."
"Yes: but, Firth, I shall pull you down, if I slip."
"Not you: but I'll come down, and so send you up to my seat, which is the safest to begin with. Stand off."
Firth swung himself down, and then, showing Hugh where to plant his feet, and propping him when he wanted it, he soon seated him on the fork, and laughed good-naturedly when Hugh waved his cap over his head, on occasion of being up in a tree. He let him get down and up again several times, till he could do it quite alone, and felt that he might have a seat here whenever it was not occupied by any one else.
While Hugh sat in the branches, venturing to leave hold with one hand, that he might fan his hot face with his cap, Firth stood on the rail of the palings, holding by the tree, and talking to him. Firth told him that this was the only tree the boys were allowed to climb, since Ned Reeve had fallen from the great ash, and hurt his spine. He showed what trees he had himself climbed before that accident; and it made Hugh giddy to think of being within eight feet of the top of the lofty elm in the church-yard, which Firth had thought nothing of mounting.
"Did anybody teach you?" asked Hugh.
"Yes; my father taught me to climb, when I was younger than you."
"And had you anybody to teach you games and things, when you came here?"
"No: but I had learned a good deal of that before I came; and so I soon fell into the ways here. Have you anybody to teach you?"
"No----yes----why, no. I thought Phil would have showed me things; but he does not seem to mind me at all." And Hugh bit his lip, and fanned himself faster.
"Ah! he attends to you more than you think."
"Does he? Then why----but what good does it do me?"
"What good? His holding off makes you push your own way. It lets you make friends for yourself."
"I have no friends here," said Hugh.
"Yes, you have. Here am I. You would not have had me, if you had been at Proctor's heels at this moment."
"Will you be my friend, then?"
"That I will."
"What, a great boy like you, that sits reading in a tree! But I may read here beside you. You said there was room for two."
"Ay; but you must not use it yet,--at least, not often, if you wish to do well here. Everybody knows I can play at anything. From the time I became captain of the wall at fives, I have had liberty to do what I like, without question. But you must show that you are up to play, before they will let you read in peace and quiet."
"But how can I, if----if----" "Once show your spirit,--prove that you can shift for yourself, and you will find Phil open out wonderfully. He and you will forget all his shyness then. Once show him that he need not be ashamed of you----" "Ashamed of me!" cried Hugh, firing up.
"Yes. Little boys are looked upon as girls in a school till they show that they are little men. And then again, you have been brought up with girls,--have not you?"
"To be sure; and so was he."
"And half the boys here, I dare say. Well, they are called Bettys till----" "I am not a Betty," cried Hugh, flashing again.
"They suppose you are, because you part your hair, and do as you have been used to do at home."
"What business have they with my hair? I might as well call them Bruins for wearing theirs shaggy."
"Very true. They will let you and your hair alone when they see what you are made of; and then Phil will----" "He will own me when I don't want it; and now, when he might help me, there he is, far off, never caring about what becomes of me!"
"O yes, he does. He is watching you all the time. You and he will have it all out some day before Christmas, and then you will see how he really cares about you. Really your hair is very long,--too like a girl's. Shall I cut it for you?"
"I should like it," said Hugh, "but I don't want the boys to think I am afraid of them; or to begin giving up to them."
"You are right there. We will let it alone now, and cut it when it suits our convenience."
"What a nice place this is, to be sure!" cried Hugh, as the feeling of loneliness went off. "But the rooks do not make so much noise as I expected."
"You will find what they can do in that way when spring comes,--when they are building."
"And when may we go out upon the heath, and into the fields where the lambs are?"
"We go long walks on Saturday afternoons; but you do not expect to see young lambs in October, do you?"
"O, I forgot. I never can remember the seasons for things."
"That shows you are a Londoner. You will learn all those things here. If you look for hares in our walks, you may chance to see one; or you may start a pheasant; but take care you don't mention lambs, or goslings, or cowslips, or any spring things; or you will never hear the last of it."
"Thank you: but what will poor Holt do? He is from India, and he knows very little about our ways."
"They may laugh at him; but they will not despise him, as they might a Londoner. Being an Indian, and being a Londoner, are very different things."
"And yet how proud the Londoners are over the country! It is very odd."
"People are proud of their own ways all the world over. You will be proud of being a Crofton boy, by-and-by."
"Perhaps I am now, a little," said Hugh, blushing.
"What, already? Ah! you will do, I see. I have known old people proud of their age, and young people of their youth. I have seen poor people proud of their poverty; and everybody has seen rich people proud of their wealth. I have seen happy people proud of their prosperity, and the afflicted proud of their afflictions. Yes; people can always manage to be proud: so you have boasted of being a Londoner up to this time; and from this time you will hold your head high as a Crofton boy."
"How long? Till when?"
"Ah! till when? What next! What do you mean to be afterwards?"
"A soldier, or a sailor, or a great traveller, or something of that kind. I mean to go quite round the world, like Captain Cook."
"Then you will come home, proud of having been round the world; and you will meet with some old neighbour who boasts of having spent all his life in the house he was born in."
"Old Mr. Dixon told mother that of himself, very lately. Oh dear, how often does the postman come?"
"You want a letter from home, do you? But you left them only yesterday morning."
"I don't know how to believe that,--it seems such an immense time! But when does the postman come?"
"Any day when he has letters to bring,--at about four in the afternoon.
We see him come, from the school-room; but we do not know who the letters are for till school breaks up at five."
"O dear!" cried Hugh, thinking what the suspense must be, and the disappointment at last to twenty boys, perhaps, for one that was gratified. Firth advised him to write a letter home before he began to expect one. If he did not like to ask the usher, he himself would rule the paper for him, and he could write a bit at a time, after his lessons were done in the evening, till the sheet was full.
Hugh then told his grievance about the usher, and Firth thought that though it was not wise in Hugh to prate about Crofton on the top of the coach, it was worse to sit by and listen without warning, unless the listener meant to hold his own tongue. But he fancied the usher had since heard something which made him sorry; and the best way now was for Hugh to bear no malice, and remember nothing more of the affair than to be discreet in his future journeys.
"What is the matter there?" cried Hugh. "O dear! something very terrible must have happened. How that boy is screaming!"
"It is only Lamb again," replied Firth. "You will soon get used to his screaming. He is a very passionate boy--I never saw such a passionate fellow."
"But what are they doing to him?"
"Somebody is putting him into a passion, I suppose. There is always somebody to do that."
"What a shame!" cried Hugh.
"Yes: I see no wit in it," replied Firth. "Anybody may do it. You have only to hold your little finger up to put him in a rage."
Hugh thought Firth was rather cool about the matter. But Firth was not so cool when the throng opened for a moment, and showed what was really done to the angry boy. Only his head appeared above ground. His school-fellows had put him into a hole they had dug, and had filled it up to his chin, stamping down the earth, so that the boy was perfectly helpless, while wild with rage.
"That is too bad!" cried Firth. "That would madden a saint."
And he jumped down from the paling, and ran towards the crowd. Hugh, forgetting his height from the ground, stood up in the tree, almost as angry as Lamb himself, and staring with all his might to see what he could. He saw Firth making his way through the crowd, evidently remonstrating, if not threatening. He saw him snatch a spade from a boy who was flourishing it in Lamb's face. He saw that Firth was digging, though half-a-dozen boys had thrown themselves on his back, and hung on his arms. He saw that Firth persevered till Lamb had got his right arm out of the ground, and was striking everywhere within reach. Then he saw Firth dragged down and away, while the boys made a circle round Lamb, putting a foot or hand within his reach, and then snatching it away again, till the boy yelled with rage at the mockery.
Hugh could look on no longer. He scrambled down from the tree, scampered to the spot, burst through the throng, and seized Lamb's hand. Lamb struck him a heavy blow, taking him for an enemy; but Hugh cried "I am your friend," seized his hand again, and tugged till he was first red and then black in the face, and till Lamb had worked his shoulders out of the hole, and seemed likely to have the use of his other arm in a trice.
Lamb's tormentors at first let Hugh alone in amazement; but they were not long in growing angry with him too. They hustled him--they pulled him all ways--they tripped him up; but Hugh's spirit was roused, and that brought his body up to the struggle again and again. He wrenched himself free, he scrambled to his feet again, as often as he was thrown down; and in a few minutes he had plenty of support. Phil was taking his part, and shielding him from many blows. Firth had got Lamb out of the hole; and the party against the tormentors was now so strong that they began to part off till the struggle ceased. Firth kept his grasp of the spade; for Lamb's passion still ran so high that there was no saying what might be the consequences of leaving any dangerous weapon within his reach. He was still fuming and stamping, Hugh gazing at him the while in wonder and fear.
"There stands your defender, Lamb," said Firth, "thinking he never saw a boy in a passion before. Come, have done with it for his sake: be a man, as he is. Here, help me to fill up this hole--both of you. Stamp down the earth, Lamb. Tread it well--tread your anger well down into it.
Think of this little friend of yours here--a Crofton boy only yesterday!"
Lamb did help to fill the hole, but he did not say a word--not one word to anybody, till the dinner-bell rang. Then, at the pump, where the party were washing their hot and dirty and bruised hands, he held out his hand to Hugh, muttering, with no very good grace-- "I don't know what made you help me, but I will never be in a passion with you:--unless you put me out, that is."
Hugh replied that he had come to help because he never could bear to see anybody _made worse_. He always tried at home to keep the little boys and girls off "drunk old Tom," as he was called in the neighbourhood. It was such a shame to make anybody worse! Lamb looked as if he was going to fly at Hugh now: but Firth put his arm round Hugh's neck, and drew him into the house, saying in his ear-- "Don't say any more that you have no friends here. You have me for one; and you might have had another--two in one morning--but for your plain speaking about drunk old Tom."
"Did I say any harm?"
"No--no harm," replied Firth; laughing. "You will do, my boy--when you have got through a few scrapes. I'm your friend, at any rate."
CHAPTER VI.
FIRST RAMBLE.
Hugh's afternoon lessons were harder than those of the morning; and in the evening he found he had so much to do that there was very little time left for writing his letter home. Some time there was, however; and Firth did not forget to rule his paper, and to let Hugh use his ink.
Hugh had been accustomed to copy the prints he found in the Voyages and Travels he read; and he could never see a picture of a savage but he wanted to copy it. He was thus accustomed to a pretty free use of his slate-pencil. He now thought that it would save a great deal of description if he sent a picture or two in his letter: so he flourished off, on the first page, a sketch of Mr. Tooke sitting at his desk at the top of the school, and of Mr. Carnaby standing at his desk at the bottom of the school.
The next evening he made haste to fill up the sheet, for he found his business increasing upon his hands so fast that he did not know when he should get his letter off, if he did not despatch it at once. He was just folding it up when Tom Holt observed that it was a pity not to put some words into the mouths of the figures, to make them more animated; and he showed Hugh, by the curious carvings of their desks, how to put words into the mouths of figures. Hugh then remembered having seen this done in the caricatures in the print-shops in London; and he seized on the idea. He put into Mr. Tooke's mouth the words which were oftenest heard from him, "Proceed, gentlemen;" and into Mr. Carnaby's, "Hold your din."
Firth was too busy with his sense-verses to mind the little boys, as they giggled, with their heads close together, over Hugh's sheet of paper; but the usher was never too busy to be aware of any fun which might possibly concern his dignity. He had his eye on the new boys the whole while. He let Hugh direct his letter, and paint up a stroke or two which did not look so well as the rest; and it was not till Hugh was rolling the wafer about on his tongue that he interfered. Mr. Carnaby then came up, tapped Hugh's head, told him not to get on so fast, for that every letter must be looked over before it went to the post. While saying this, he took the letter, and put it into his waistcoat pocket.
In vain Hugh begged to have it again, saying he would write another. The more he begged, and the more dismayed Tom Holt looked, the less Mr.
Carnaby would attend to either. Firth let himself be interrupted to hear the case: but he could do nothing in it. It was a general rule, which he thought every boy had known; and it was too late now to prevent the letter being looked over.
Mr. Carnaby was so angry at the liberty Hugh had taken with his face and figure, that, in spite of all prayers, and a good many tears, he walked up the school with the letter, followed by poor Hugh, as soon as Mr.
Tooke had taken his seat next morning. Hugh thought that Holt, who had put him up to the most offensive part of the pictures, might have borne him company; but Holt was a timid boy, and he really had not courage to leave his seat. So Hugh stood alone, awaiting Mr. Tooke's awful words, while the whole of the first class looked up from their books, in expectation of what was to happen. They waited some time for the master's words; for he was trying to help laughing. He and Mr. Carnaby were so much alike in the pictures, and both so like South Sea islanders, that it was impossible to help laughing at the thought of this sketch going abroad as a representation of the Crofton masters. At last, all parties laughed aloud, and Mr. Tooke handed Hugh his wafer-glass, and bade him wafer up his letter, and by all means send it.
Mr. Carnaby could not remain offended, if his principal was not angry: so here the matter ended, except that Hugh made some strong resolutions about his future letters; and that the corners of the master's mouth were seen to be out of their usual order several times in the course of the morning.
This incident, and everything which haunted Hugh's mind, and engrossed his attention, was a serious evil to him; for his business soon grew to be more than his habit of mind was equal to. In a few days, he learned to envy the boys (and they were almost the whole school) who could fix their attention completely and immediately on the work before them, and relax as completely, when it was accomplished. When his eyes were wandering, they observed boy after boy frowning over his dictionary, or repeating to himself, earnestly and without pause; and presently the business was done, and the learner at ease, feeling confident that he was ready to meet his master. After double the time had passed, Hugh was still trying to get the meaning of his lesson into his head--going over the same words a dozen times, without gaining any notion of their meaning--suffering, in short, from his long habit of inattention at home. He did now try hard; but he seemed to get only headaches for his pains. His brother saw enough to make him very sorry for Hugh before ten days was over. He might not, perhaps, have been struck with his anxious countenance, his frequent starts, and his laying his head down on his desk because it ached so, if it had not been for what happened at night.
Sometimes Hugh started out of bed, and began to dress, when the elder boys went up with their light, only an hour after the younger ones.
Sometimes he would begin saying his syntax in the middle of the night, fancying he was standing before Mr. Carnaby; and once, he walked in his sleep as far as the head of the stairs, and then suddenly woke, and could not make out where he was. Phil should have told Mr. Tooke of these things; but Hugh was so very anxious that nobody should know of his "tricks" (as the boys in his room called his troubles), that Phil only mentioned the matter to Mrs. Watson, who had known so many bad sleepers among little boys, and had so little idea that the habit was anything new, that she took scarcely any notice of it. She had his hair cut very short and close, and saw that he took a moderate supper, and was satisfied that all would be well. Hugh did not part with his hair till he had joked himself about its length, as much as any one could quiz him for it. When he had pulled it down over the end of his nose, and peeped through it, like an owl out of an ivy-bush, he might be supposed to part with it voluntarily, and not because he was laughed at.
Phil's observation of his brother's toil and trouble led him to give him some help. Almost every day he would hear Hugh say his lesson--or try to say it; for the poor boy seldom succeeded. Phil sometimes called him stupid, and sometimes refrained from saying so, whatever he might think; but there really was very little difference in the result, whether Phil heard the lessons beforehand or not; and it gave Joe Cape a great advantage over Phil that he had no little brother to attend to.
Considering how selfish rivalship is apt to make boys (and even men), it was perhaps no wonder that Phil sometimes kept out of Hugh's way at the right hour, saying to himself that his proper business was to do his lessons, and get or keep ahead of Joe Cape; and that Hugh must take his chance, and work his own way, as other boys had to do. This conduct might not be wondered at in Phil; but it hurt Hugh, and made him do his lessons all the worse. He did not like to expose his brother's unkindness to any one, or he would oftener have asked Firth to help him.
Firth, too, had plenty of work of his own to do. More than once, however, Firth met the little lad, wandering about, with his grammar in his hand, in search of the hidden Phil; and then Firth would stop him, and sit down with him, and have patience, and give him such clear explanations, such good examples of the rules he was to learn, that it all became easy, and Hugh found his lessons were to him only what those of other boys seemed to them. Still, however, and at the best, Hugh was, as a learner, far too much at the mercy of circumstances--the victim of what passed before his eyes, or was said within his hearing.
Boys who find difficulty in attending to their lessons are sure to be more teased with interruptions than any others. Holt had not the habit of learning; and he and Hugh were continually annoyed by the boys who sat near them watching how they got on, and making remarks upon them.
One day, Mr. Tooke was called out of the school-room to a visitor, and Mr. Carnaby went up to take the master's place, and hear his class. This was too good an opportunity for the boys below to let slip; and they began to play tricks,--most of them directed against Hugh and Tom Holt.
One boy, Warner, began to make the face that always made Holt laugh, however he tried to be grave. Page drew a caricature of Mrs. Watson on his slate, and held it up; and Davison took a mask out of his desk, and even ventured to tie it on, as if it had not been school-time.
"I declare I can't learn my lesson--'tis too bad!" cried Hugh.
"'Tis a shame!" said Tom Holt, sighing for breath after his struggle not to laugh. "We shall never be ready."
Hugh made gestures of indignation at the boys, which only caused worse faces to be made, and the mask to nod.