which made it sometimes difficult for his teachers to be very angry with him. They did not know the worst part of his character.

"All nonsense, Bowler; I tell you we will go-we must; I would not lose the fun for anything. You have no idea what sport we could have."

"No doubt of it, if we could get there; but what is the use of talking about it? We can't go, you know, and-"

"Nonsense!-can't go! I say again, the governor will let us go if we ask him."

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No, no, no!" exclaimed half a dozen voices at once.

"Was he ever asked?" inquired Bardour. No, never, certainly-all were sure of that; it was too well known what Mr. D-'s sentiments about the fair were.

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Why," said one, "he was one that tried, two or three years ago, to get it put down: the idea of asking him to let us go!

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Well, for all that, I don't see anything so preposterous in the idea," said Bardour; "and I vote for asking leave."

"All very fine," replied Bowler; "but who'll bell the cat ?""

do

"Oh, we will all go in a string; or what you say to a round robin?"

No, no, oh dear no: all hung back in alarm at the very mention of it.

"What a set of cowards you all are! what is there to be afraid of? Well, if you won't,

I will-I and friend Willy here. We will go at once and ask for the holiday-eh, Willy?”

Willy would gladly have retreated from such undesirable pre-eminence; but from being Bardour's companion he had become almost his slave. He dared not refuse. He tried, however, to express his dissent. "What will be the use?" he began to ask.

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"We'll see,” replied his bolder companion: come along, the governor's just gone into school-come;" and he half dragged his friend along the playground.

They soon returned to the half-scared boys. Willy looked very sheepish; Bardour very furious; and he applied some opprobrious names to the head-master in a not very subdued tone, as he mingled with the rest.

"I told you it would be of no use," said Willy; "and you have only got me into a scrape you have."

"What did he say?-what?-what?" asked the gaping group of their deputation.

"Say!" repeated Bardour fiercely: "go and ask yourselves if you want to know. If you had not been a pack of cowards you would have known without being told."

you,

"No more a coward than "said one of the boys thus taunted; and a quarrel ensued, which almost ended in blows. But it passed off, and very little more was said about the fair: the subject seemed dropped by common consent. It was noticed, however, and after

K

wards remembered, that during the succeeding days Bardour and Willy kept almost aloof from their companions; that they were constantly in close private confabulation; and that Bardour especially was remarkably gleeful. Some huge secret seemed to exist between them.

One day it was the third day of the fairas the boys were about to leave the breakfastroom, they were requested to remain. The teachers looked grave; and the scholars, catching the infection of gravity, looked so too, though why they knew not.

Presently, the master entered. The boys had seen him before, when they had met for morning prayers, and the change that had taken place was almost alarming-quite alarming to guilty consciences, if any were there. Accompanying the master was a stranger, shabbily dressed, dirty, unshorn, and otherwise ill-looking.

"What's the matter now?" whispered one boy to his neighbour.

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Hallo," said another, in an equally subdued tone, "look at Willy; why, he is as pale as a turnip, and trembles like a leaf; what is the meaning of all this?"

This was bye-play. Meanwhile Mr. Dlooked sorrowfully around, then turned to the man, who stood a little nearer the door"Have the kindness, my friend, to point them out to me," said he.